The Bentlefay Papers

Blog Note

noreply@blogger.com (kathy monahan) — Mon, 01 Nov 2010 18:52:00 +0000

After a week or so of deep thought on the matter, I've decided to put The Bentlefay Papers on an open-ended hiatus. I've kept it up for almost a year and I'm starting to want to concentrate on other projects for awhile. I'm going to take down the four chapters of "The Dahavi Diplomacy" on Friday the 5th and save them to post again when the whole arc is ready, but "The Marshweathrian War" and "The Norhammer Conflict" will remain up in their entirety.

If you've just stumbled upon Bentlefay, you can find the two complete story arcs of 35 chapters apiece in the Table of Contents. If you've been following along this whole time, I'd really like to thank the four of you (hi Mom!). This experience has taught me a lot that I really needed to know about fiction writing, and having you along for the ride has been great. If you want to be notified when I start posting again, or even if you just want to say hello, feel free to leave a comment or drop me an email.

Thanks again!
Kathy Monahan

In Which the Honeymoon Occurs Without Us

noreply@blogger.com (kathy monahan) — Fri, 10 Sep 2010 17:51:00 +0000

Dear Readers-

Many thanks to everyone who kept coming back for more of the Norhammer Conflict -- I hope you all enjoyed it as much as I did! Lynde and Tom's wedding seems to be a natural place to pause, so I'm going to take a break from updating for about the next month to rummage out another story from the archives.

So stop by again on Tuesday, October 12 for the next chapter in history, in which Bentlefay sends a diplomatic mission to a faraway land; Lynde experiences changes not uncommon to the first year of marriage; and a beginning does, in fact, finally happen for Princess Dulcie.

Thanks again! Hope to see you in October.

Next

In Which a Wedding is Celebrated at Court

noreply@blogger.com (kathy monahan) — Tue, 07 Sep 2010 17:04:00 +0000

From the diary of Dulcie, Crown Princess of Bentlefay:

Well, we have had our wedding, and the happy couple is gone for a long month to Dumcruckle. My one consolation is that they have taken Master Falconer with them. He has been up the skirt of every lady and maid who will allow him there – I will say for him that at least he recognizes that distinction; we have had guests who do not – and the household has been in a state of chaos as a result. He has treated Mother and me like pieces of porcelain, but we and Lynde seemed to have been the only ones immune.

Lynde had been worried about my safety in her absence, but the matter was quite magically resolved, since with Rafe still too convalescent to do much, Tarpley is at quite a loose end, and it has been arranged that they will spend most of their time with me and Tarpley will be my bodyguard for the interim. It works out well for me at least, because as much as I love Lynde, she is just too kindly to be a truly fascinating conversationalist. Rafe has never had that problem, so the month will go quite quickly.

The ceremony was beautiful, and quite different from Winnie’s hurried wedding just a month ago. The whole court was in attendance for Lynde and Tom, and I am confident that it will be considered the fashionable wedding of the year.

It took place in the evening, with a real royal feast that took days to prepare. The household staff was pleased at the opportunity to show off their skills, and in any case they adore Lynde, even sour old Tess who scourged her myrmidons into a frenzy of simmering, roasting, basting, baking and boiling for the event.

We finally managed to finish Lynde’s green gown by dint of sewing feverishly on it at every waking moment, even giving up dancing in order to flay our fingers in the cause of fashion. The results amply justified our care: when we were arraying her to go out Lynde looked like the queen of happiness. Her hair was loose and streamed gloriously down her back, with a gold fillet keeping it away from her face. We had given her a golden torc for her neck and lent her small gold hoops for her ears, and the whole of her gleamed as though burnished.

“Tom will be awestruck,” Mother said.

“Maybe he will faint, and the wedding will have to be postponed,” I added, perhaps a touch hopefully.

“Dulcie!”

“Do you really think it is all right?” Lynde asked, more shyly than I would have expected from her.

“My dear,” Mother said, “you are as beautiful outside as you are in your heart, and I have no praise higher than that.”

So we went out to the hall, where Father already stood magnificent at the top of the room with Tom, and the massed courtiers made a gaily colored background. The household staff stood in the back, those who were not directly responsible for the feast at that moment, and there were many preliminary snifflings among the maids. I knew how they felt.

The bugles struck up, and Lynde swept into the hall on her father’s arm. I had seen her just a few minutes before and thought her beautiful, but now the glow of happiness that suffused her made her ten times more lovely. I sneaked a glance at Tom and did not see a trace of the awe I expected in his eyes, which irked me a little until I realized that he had not even noticed her dress but was looking at her self, with a certainty and gratitude that set all the trappings at nought.

I am ashamed to say that I hardly remember the ceremony. It seemed to come at me in impressions: Father’s solemn voice in the ceremony and the two clear voices in response, the sunset through the upper windows falling on Lynde’s hair, the look in Tom’s eyes, and finally the bugles playing them out, as resplendent as if they were king and queen themselves.

The feast was of course the kind of miracle that only Tess could perform, and most of the guests gorged themselves to repletion, but I found I could only pick at my food. Lynde would be going tomorrow, and although she would be coming back in a month, things were bound to be forever changed. Her first responsibility would necessarily be to her husband, not to me, and although I hated to think of myself as a particularly needy person, it made me feel awfully lonely.

Oddly enough, the one who understood was Tom.

The guests were at their dancing, the feast lay in shattered remnants on the trestles and Lynde was blithely receiving the congratulations of the household.

“She loves you, too,” he said, coming up behind me.

“Never mind about me,” I said hastily. “If I couldn’t bear not being the center of attention at someone else’s wedding, I’d be a selfish person indeed.”

He laughed. “Of course not. But, you know, it seemed a little as though you thought something was ending.”

“It is a little, though, isn’t it?”

“Not so much as you might think. And beginnings are nice too, take it from me.”

“I’m looking forward to seeing the library in a few months, certainly.”

I hesitated, then leaned over and kissed him on the cheek. “Congratulations, Master Crowder. You are a fortunate man, but it seems to me you are worthy of it.”

Tom put his hand to his cheek. “Is the kiss of a princess supposed to be good luck?”

I smiled. “You will have to make it so.”

“Tom, darling!” Lynde called at that moment. “Tess wants to tell you something!”

So he trotted over obediently and was absorbed back into the congratulations, leaving me with a little more to think about, but somewhat comforted.

Beginnings, I thought. I wonder if it will ever happen to me.

But just then the bugles struck up again, and I was unable to think about it anymore.

In Which Introductions Are Made

noreply@blogger.com (kathy monahan) — Fri, 03 Sep 2010 17:08:00 +0000

From the diary of Dulcie, Crown Princess of Bentlefay:

Well, Lynde’s young man got here today with her father, and I suppose I will have to let her go to him, damn his eyes.

They got here in the midafternoon right before I took my rest, and since of course they don’t travel with a herald they caught us on the hop. The majordomo sent a maidservant to give us the word, and she came in with her eyes as big as saucers and her hands clasped, and said “Please, your majesty, Mistress Lynde’s young man is here, and, oh please, Mistress Lynde, will you--?”

But by then Lynde was gone, and I had to scurry back into my regular dress and race down the stairs, by which point their first meeting was all over. I was disappointed at the time, since I always find that sort of thing very romantic to watch, but it worked out for the best, since Lynde was able to present her father Owen and her betrothed Tom without delay.

Master Falconer is a large old man, not as large as Lynde anymore since he is bowed by rheumatism and age, but still the sketched outline of the burly arms-master he once was. He has snow-white hair and an enormous, plumy white moustache, and his cheekbones and chin are hard and prominent the way they are in the north. His face is burned brown from the sun, and his eyes are as gray and bleak as the north wind. He bowed to me, awkwardly because of his rheumatism but quite correctly, and said I was a precious flower, or some such vintage-flavored compliment.

“I can see you mean to be a terror with the ladies, Master Falconer,” I said to tease him.

“I surely do,” he answered, not teasing at all. “We don’t have much scope for it up in Dumcruckle.”

“Father, you’re incorrigible,” said Lynde. “Come and meet Tom, your majesty.”

Tom is somewhat below medium height, which makes him a little taller than I am but almost ludicrously shorter than Lynde, and he is slight and perhaps a little bit stooped, in the manner of those who spend their days indoors. His hair is that dull mouse-color that the old nursemaids call dishwater, and his eyes are large and softly brown like a dog’s. His face is long and prematurely lined, with the grooves that go from nose to chin and with the laugh-wrinkles that radiate out from the eyes. The general impression he gives is of a schoolmaster with a slightly disreputable secret.

“So you are here to take Lynde from me,” I said, because I was still feeling a little bit resentful.

He grinned. “You can think of it this way,” he said, “you aren’t losing a bodyguard, you’re gaining a librarian. I think you are getting an excellent bargain, myself. In any case,” he grew solemn for a moment, “I will try to make it worth your while.”

I understood what he was trying to say, and relented. “I am sure it will be worth while,” I replied. “You needn’t try too hard.”

“Of course we will both try hard,” Lynde interrupted, not understanding at all. “Tom is not a slacker, any more than I am.”

At that moment Father and Mother created a diversion by bustling in.

“There!” Mother exclaimed. “Oh, Lynde, I am so pleased that your family has been able to make their journey safely.”

So the introductions had to be made all over again, and this time more formally, on account of Mother and Father being Queen and King. That did not stop Master Falconer from ogling Mother, and for the first time in my living memory I actually saw her at a loss for words.

“Your majesty,” Master Falconer said, “your face has just earned every drop of blood I ever shed for Bentlefay.

“Not that I wouldn’t have been pleased to do it for an ugly Queen, of course,” he added hastily.

“Well,” said Mother after an pause, “that certainly is one way of looking at it.”

“No offense, of course.”

“Oh, not in the world.”

“I am offended,” Father said solemnly. “I didn’t think at my time of life that I would be faced with a rival, Master Falconer.”

“I couldn’t be a rival, your majesty,” Master Falconer said reasonably. “Not to a man who can clap me in prison any time he likes.”

“I suppose it is nice to know that there is something stopping you,” said Mother, and everyone laughed.

Tom went over similarly well, striking just the right balance between courtesy and friendliness.

“I feel that I am a poor addition to Lynde, but I hope that I will be a worthy one,” he said to Mother.

“If you can get that benighted library into some kind of order, you’ll be worth your weight in gold,” Father interrupted. “That room is like an albatross around my neck and I’ll be glad to hand over responsibility for it.”

“Excellent,” Tom answered. “I look forward to getting my hands on it. I enjoy a really knotty cataloguing problem.” And indeed his brown eyes gleamed acquisitively as he said it, so apparently he really does.

“We are pleased to have you here, for your own sake as well as Lynde’s,” Mother said more formally, and then fell back into the vernacular. “She has been pining like a dairy maid ever since we got word you were coming.”

Lynde blushed. “Of course we haven’t seen each other for quite a long time,” she began, and stuck there.

Mother took pity on her. “Why don’t you take Master Crowder to the solar and show him the view? Your father can come with the rest of us to my sitting-room and tell me more about my face.”

So Lynde and Tom went with alacrity, and everyone else made their way to Mother’s sitting- room while I trailed back to my room for my rest – a little bit irritably, I don’t mind admitting. It seems I won’t even have the comfort of loathing the wretch. I suppose I didn’t imagine that Lynde would choose unwisely, but for some reason I don’t feel all that much better about it.

In Which Plans are Made, and Gratitude Expressed

noreply@blogger.com (kathy monahan) — Tue, 31 Aug 2010 16:52:00 +0000

Lynde Falconer to Thomas Crowder:

Dear Tom,

I most certainly wish to be married soon, and my heart lifted when you suggested it – and then fell, when I thought of leaving my friends and the place I’ve been able to make for myself here. Oh, please don’t think I have second thoughts – I would live with you at Dumcruckle, or in a mountain cave, or at the bottom of the sea so long as we could be married. But the princess has made us a most interesting offer, to which I hope you will give serious thought – it seems to me the answer to prayer.

She would like us to make our home here at the Tower, where I can continue my duties as her bodyguard and, it has become, somewhat as her lady-in-waiting, as well. Of course you would need to take up a post of some sort here, and she thought of that too: currently, Bentlefay Tower has a large library and archive, with books from the Nine Kingdoms and beyond as well as documents going back into the mists of history, and the whole thing falling to pieces in the absence of a full-time archivist. Generations of kings have added to their collection, putting the books in the shelves with no reference to order and relying on their own memories to know where everything is. In this generation it is the princess’ memory that serves as a catalogue, but she has duties of her own and cannot be expected to put in the hours of manual work each day that it would require to put everything in order and make a written list.

It seems to me that this is the perfect outlet for your particular talents, and that you could do real good here. I know that we will be missed at home, but Sir Roger and Lady Dumcruckle would have had to make new plans for the school and the archiving anyhow when you and I wed and began to farm. The only matter unresolved would be Father, and he could come and live with us just as easily as he could back home.

What do you suppose, dearest Tom – shall we do it? I admit that the prospect interests me; I have seen so much of history over the last weeks that it would seem dull to be out of the way of it – although of course, you made history of your own at Dumcruckle during the siege, which shows you how much I know.

Please do not refuse right away; give it a day or two of thought. I would not want to press you, or to influence you to take a step that you are reluctant to take, but do think about it. We can always go back home if we do not think the arrangement is working – that is the nice thing about home; one can always go back.

Your loving,
Lynde

----------

Thomas Crowder to Lynde Falconer:

Dearest Lynde,

Of course we will go and live the high life at the Tower; I began packing my things before I even finished reading your letter. Finally I can tell you just how bestially envious I was that it was you who were going into the world to make your fortune, and I who was staying at home to spin. Why, in the last week I have been chewing my own pillow at nights in agony that I would never travel farther than the next estate, and that you would always hold it against me.

The description you give of the library has my mouth watering to sink my teeth into the project. Our library here, though comprehensive for a remote country manor, would be sadly modest on the world stage, and in any case it has been in perfect order for at least the last fifteen years, leaving little scope for my talents.

I have discussed the matter with your father, and he will be very sorry to have you so far away, but he was utterly firm in the matter of staying where he is. He says that he has spent his life here and he has the respect of his years of service; in the capital he would only be a burden to hold you back. I did my best to dissuade him, but I can rather see his point; a healthy country life is better for an old man than the glittering court you describe. Now that Minnie and Mistress Rebecca are settled at Dumcruckle for good, he will have his family with him and all the care, affection and daily arguments he needs to keep him hearty.

The one condition he would make is that he would like to see you married, and of course I said we would do whatever was needed to make it so. He is perfectly fit to travel with me to the capital if we take it easy, and you and I could bring him home together, if the princess is willing to allow you a honeymoon.

Lynde dearest, you have no idea how much this suggestion has done for me. To be an expert among books instead of an amateur on a farm is a far more fulfilling future than I had expected.

I will be with you in a week, my darling – dream of me!

Your own,
Tom

----------

Christina, Queen Consort of Bentlefay, to Robert “Long Bob” Langstrom of the Golden Gull:

Dear Bob,

I owe you a debt for keeping Dulcie safe through what turned out to be much more exciting an adventure than most of us anticipated. On the other hand, of course, you seem to have given her a story she can hold over my head any time she cares to, so in that sense, we can call it even.

Ah, well, I can forgive much in a man who has ensured the safety of the realm in general and my daughter in particular – not that I was ever able to stay angry at you for long. You are a good man, with a generous heart, a nimble wit and a prodigious reach. But then, I have had no reason to believe that you would have altered in any of those respects from your youth.

I have sent you along a nice selection from our treasury in an attractively carved wooden chest which you may recognize, as it is of our mutual great-grandfather’s manufacture and the one upon which I happened to be sitting when you first proposed marriage twenty-six years ago. The treasure, if you would be so kind, is to be divided among all the men who fought on Bentlefay’s behalf. The chest is for you – in gratitude, and in remembrance.

Yours very truly,
Tina

In Which Our Heroes Arrive Home

noreply@blogger.com (kathy monahan) — Fri, 27 Aug 2010 16:11:00 +0000

From the diary of Dulcie, Crown Princess of Bentlefay:

I have always gotten on well with my parents but I don’t believe I have ever been more delighted to see them than I was when we got home yesterday. After much head-scratching in the matter of logistics, I was finally able to arrive at court just in time for the receiving like everyone else seems to. Thus, our reunion turned out to be embarrassingly public as I found myself haring up the room at a full run, hurling myself on Mother and bursting into tears in front of the entire court.

“There, now,” she murmured, with a tenderness in her voice which I haven’t heard since I was in short skirts, “such a fuss.”

It was a familiar phrase, and it had never before failed to convince me that any childish fancies of fear or hurt were just that, but this was altogether different. I found myself stammering out the story from the very beginning, complete with backtracks and interjections when I forgot something.

I suppose I must have been growing rather hysterical – an unfortunate tendency of late; I’ve never had it before – because by the time I was done with the thing I found myself in my own room with Mother and Father and Lynde, without being quite sure how we got there.

“Heavens!” Father sputtered when I had dithered to a close. “Head in a basket! What damned infernal … impudence. I never wanted to send our daughter to sea with pirates, Christina. I knew something like this would happen.”

“Oh, nonsense,” Mother retorted. “You see they took excellent care of her – she came home without a scratch. I told you we could trust Long Bob.”

I felt that she was not taking my great adventure seriously enough and could not resist a dig.

“He asked to be remembered to you, by the way – for the sake of old times.”

“Well, yes,” Mother said equably. “I told you we once knew each other quite well.”

“Not as much as he told me,” I rejoined, and had the pleasure of seeing Mother look disconcerted.

“I shall certainly have to write him a line or two in gratitude,” she said in the manner of one to whom the subject was closed. “Now, you clearly need a good night’s rest if the performance you gave is any indication. I will have a tray sent up. And, Lynde, if you are not too tired to come with me and give me your briefing, I would be very grateful.”

She swept grandly from the room with Lynde in her wake, but Father lingered for a moment.

“I’m glad you’re all right, little girl,” he said gruffly, and then his face squinched up and his voice wavered. “I can’t spare you, you know.”

He swept me up in an enormous bear hug, planted a kiss on my cheek so firmly that I can feel it yet, and trotted hurriedly after Mother. I slept the whole night like I’d been hit on the head with a hammer, and I had no dreams at all.

Lynde horrified me deeply this morning by appearing at my bedside at dawn dressed in her fighting leathers, and informing me that it was time to go out and drill.

“What?” I croaked with all the strength I could muster. “That’s the maddest thing I’ve ever heard, and I’ve heard Mortimer Bleake. Can’t I sleep in for one morning after the time we’ve had?”

“We might not get many more chances,” Lynde said somberly, “and I’d like to think you can take care of yourself once I’ve left.”

“Once you’ve –” I began, but she feigned deafness and I was forced to dress hurriedly and trail after her to the practice ring, snatching up a handful of bread from the dining hall as we passed through.

I had hoped we would become embroiled in girlish talk and forget about drill altogether, but to my disgust, it wasn’t until we had run through the whole practice and were walking around the ring to cool down that she deigned to elaborate.

“Tom wants to get married soon,” she said abruptly out of nowhere.

I was thoroughly exhausted and inclined to be uncaring. “Well, of course he does. Don’t you?” I snapped.

But then I realized what she meant. “Oh. That means you’re going to leave me and go play at farming in Dumcruckle, doesn’t it?” I sighed. “I told you that you should have let me sleep.”

Lynde wrung her hands. “It isn’t as though I want to,” she said. “You know I’ll never be as good a farm wife as I am a royal bodyguard – it feels like early death when I think about it. I’ve always been rather a freak in Dumcruckle and even Tom complained that they had gone back to taking him for granted. I don’t imagine I’ll ever do so much good for anyone as I’ve been able to do here.

“But I love him, and he’s right – we can’t just live our whole lives apart.”

There seemed to be no answer to this, and I was preparing a very bad mood indeed, when an idea struck me.

“I say, Lynde,” I said diffidently, “you don’t suppose he’d want to come and live here? I’m sure we could find him a post of some sort that’s more in his line than teaching school in Dumcruckle. The archives are getting out of control, for instance – we could use someone who knows what they’re doing, and it sounds like he enjoys that sort of thing. Why don’t the two of you get married and then stay on here? Tom could be the archivist, and you could go on being my bodyguard. I’m sure we’d appreciate both of you more than they would back home.”

Lynde stopped in her tracks and looked dazed. “I never thought of that. We don’t have to live in Dumcruckle at all, do we?”

“Do you think he’d consider it?”

“I don’t know. It’s worth a try though, isn’t it? Oh!” she exclaimed, and leaped over the rail of the practice ring in a single bound. “I’m going to write to him right now!”

And she was off with the speed of wind, leaving me to hobble back to the castle under my own motive power. With Lynde off duty, I didn’t think anyone would notice if I went back to bed.

In Which Amends are Made

noreply@blogger.com (kathy monahan) — Tue, 24 Aug 2010 17:14:00 +0000

Lynde Falconer to Master Owen Falconer:

Dear Father,

Our latest adventure has been unlike any other I’ve ever had, and among other things has altogether disinclined me ever again to go on the sea for any reason. However, it has all ended well, and I have done my duty toward the protection of the princess once again.

The pirates are most interesting folk, if not particularly predictable. I have never met people like them before, and although I had my doubts about them at the beginning, they fought well and loyally on our behalf when things came to that, and I am now proud to call them my friends.

After two days at sea we made our rendezvous with the pirate ships, and the princess signed the treaty with them on behalf of Bentlefay. The pirates then were our hosts for an impressive feast, but just as we finished the sweet course the watch called a warning. Our ships were being attacked by three Norhammer vessels, and since the pirates are not to be beaten at sea, we defeated them handily.

In my foolishness I thought that would be the extent of our adventure, but I should have known by now that that man Bleake would have a trick up his sleeve. He and a contingent of Norhammers used the distraction of the battle to board the flagship, where they were able to take us utterly by surprise and capture the princess and I into custody.

They locked me straight away in the galley where I was, as you may say, effectively neutralized. Fortunately, the princess was locked in the captain’s cabin and left to her own devices, so she was able to send a message to the pirates via mermaid. I know – it sounds ridiculous when written out like that, but she swears with her hand on her heart that that is how it happened, and I have never known her to tell a lie. I saw a much larger group of merfolk with my own eyes the following morning, so I can assure you at least that they exist.

In any case, the pirates came to our aid the next morning at daybreak. It was a grand battle, most of which I only heard from my place in the galley. Once I was released, it was only to find that Norhammer’s captain, Duke Harker, still held the princess captive and was preparing to bargain with her person for a long list of political concessions, most of which he would likely have gotten had the princess not managed to extricate herself through her own strength and daring, in the form of a well-placed blow below the belt.

We brought our captives back to Seaward, but the night before we got there we discovered the brig broken open, the guard unconscious and Bleake and Harker gone without a trace. When we got to Seaward, we found Harker’s body washed ashore, but Bleake remains at large, and as much as I’d like to think that he is gone for good, I’m afraid that the sea wouldn’t keep him, and he will be back somehow to plague us all.

Meanwhile, the Norhammer crewmen gave us a surprise by begging us to allow them to remain in Bentlefay. They said they would happily remain prisoners or even work as slave labor, since the dishonor of losing a battle without being killed would make their lives unlivable back in their native land. The king and queen are taking the matter under advisement, but I feel sure that the ultimate fate of these men will be more humane than they fear.

Though the day was saved by a combination of forces, one thing I have grown to realize is that there is nothing like danger at sea to make one appreciate the amenities of land. I long to hear how things go with you and with everyone else at home, and though we have only been gone a week, I feel a changed person. If I could presume upon you to give Master Crowder my apologies for my behavior, and tell him that I wish him happiness in whatever choice he makes, I would be very grateful.

With love,
Your Lynde

----------

Master Owen Falconer to Lynde Falconer, with difficulty:

Dear Lynde,

Stop being an imbecile. The boy can’t stop pining for you and has become a thorough bore. For lord’s sake make it up with him. I am an old man.

Yours,
Father

P.S. Your cousin Minnie has announced her betrothal to Timothy Dumcruckle, so can things please go back to normal?

----------

Lynde Falconer to Thomas Crowder:

Dear Tom,

I have tried with every ounce of brain I possess to craft a letter that will make you forgive me, through passionate mellifluousness if nothing else. But the only thing I can say is that I’ve been a fool. I thought so low of my value as a wife that I suppose I just assumed that you would look elsewhere so long as you had the opportunity. I cringe with shame when I think of how I behaved; you must have thought me possessed.

But that is all gone now. I never would have thought that going to sea with pirates to have such a clarifying effect on one’s emotional intelligence, but that is how it has turned out. I hope you can look upon the whole thing as an aberration, and forgive me.

Your loving,
Lynde

----------

Thomas Crowder to Lynde Falconer:

Dear Lynde,

Oh, my darling, the fault was all mine. You needed love and reassurance, but I couldn’t see past my pride. I was convinced that poor Minnie was an excuse for you to rid yourself of an entanglement that had become unwanted since your exposure to grander and better men at court. It was my discontent speaking, and it was unfair of me to take it out on you.

Ah, well, I hope that as two fools, at least we deserve each other. When can we be married, dear Lynde? We have been apart far too long.

Your own,
Tom

In Which Goodbyes are Said

noreply@blogger.com (kathy monahan) — Fri, 20 Aug 2010 17:24:00 +0000

From the diary of Dulcie, Crown Princess of Bentlefay:

(continued from here)

There was another feast this afternoon, more raffish and less formal than yesterday’s but by the same token much friendlier and more comfortable, now that we had all seen each other bruised and unconscious and captive and bleeding, experienced adversity together and come out the other end.

Lynde had apparently made her (lack of) intentions known to Masters in private conversation, and he was taking it on the chin although I could tell he was feeling it. He did not sit down for the feast but busied himself instead with the logistics of the thing – directing boats back and forth, setting watches on all the ships and generally keeping in the background.

The Norhammer crewmen had been utterly deflated by the revelation that their generations-long superiority complex had been built on sand, and while they were invited to join the feast in exchange for their oath, they actually preferred to remain bound. Bleake and Harker were of course not given this opportunity and shared the Porteous’ tiny brig with a crewman in charge to make sure they didn’t do each other any irreparable damage.

The Porteous hosted today’s feast and since it lacked the facilities of the Gull, we contented ourselves with fish stew, fresh bread and wine from the captain’s own barrel, and found nothing lacking. When we could eat no more, the crew of the Porteous assembled to sing, which they apparently make rather a thing of, and dazzled everyone with their plaintive harmonies.

The sun was low enough to be in our eyes, and the men had moved on from exhibitions into round singing, when Masters materialized at my side without warning.

“I beg your pardon, your majesty – may I have a word?”

I had been gazing dreamily at the singing men with my chin in my hand and my elbow on my knee. The effects of my broken sleep the night before were beginning to seep into my bones, and I wasn’t at all sure I hadn’t nodded off.

“Oh, of course,” I said hastily. “I haven’t even thanked you for your help in saving us. If you hadn’t sent Kah-ee-lah along last night, we’d be on our way to Norhammer by now.”

“I had in mind quite a different effect,” he admitted wryly, “but of course I am glad it worked out as well as it did.” He looked across the deck at Lynde, being taught by the second mate to play the ocarina, and sighed.

I put my hand on his arm. “I’m sorry.”

He smiled, a surprisingly sweet smile. “I’ll live.”

Lynde blew into the ocarina, making a sound like a dozen dying crows, and burst out laughing. Masters turned to me.

“Tell me – if you would be so kind. This young man of hers. What kind of a man is he?”

I thought for a moment. “I suppose he's a hero,” I said slowly. “He broke a siege practically on his own during the last war. He saved an entire manor from harm and hardship, and when they forgot about it, he continued to serve them with loyalty and a sense of humor. To tell the truth, it puts me to shame when I think about it.”

“Ah.” His chin sank on his chest dejectedly. “He is worthy of her, then.”

“I really do think he is.”

We sat in maudlin commiseration for a moment or two.

“She has told me that she will remain my friend, at least,” Masters said at length.

“Well, I certainly can’t think of a better one.”

“Then I will try to be comforted with that.”

Long Bob got up at that moment from where he and our captain had been in earnest conversation and came up to us, trailing pirates and bonhomie.

“We’d better get ourselves gone,” he said to Masters. “They will want to get their prisoners home into a real jail for safety’s sake.”

“Certainly.” Masters turned to me. “Thank you, your majesty, for the hospitality of your fleet. We are all pleased with the new alliance, and hope it will be a long and fruitful one.”

He bowed over my hand and moved away, leaving me to make another round of farewells to Long Bob.

“Goodbye again,” I said, feeling as though ceremony was no longer necessary. “Although I’m almost afraid to say it lest another attack rise up out of nowhere.”

“Ah, no, those poor scoundrels have had their bubble burst for a generation. A rare bother they’ve been to the merfolk, too, with their posturing.”

“Ah, yes, the merfolk,” I said as casually as I could. “How is it that you are acquainted with merfolk, if I may ask?”

Long Bob hesitated. “I’m afraid there’s a bit of secrecy about it,” he said eventually. “Let’s just say that it’s a pirate thing, and leave it at that.”

“Fair enough,” I answered. “You’ll have to visit us at court someday – maybe Mother will get it out of you.”

The mention of Mother seemed to get Long Bob onto a new tack.

“You’ll tell her everything?” he demanded. “You’ll tell her the welcome we gave you, and the feast, and the way we protected you even in harm’s way? You’ll remember me to your sainted ma?”

“Of course,” I said, surprised. “Why wouldn’t I?”

Long Bob heaved a sigh. “If I tell you something, will you swear to keep it?”

“I suppose,” I said, surprised at the sudden fourteen-year-old girl direction that the conversation was taking. “Although if it has to do with national security or some such, I’d better not.”

“No, it’s just the sad tale of how a smart man can do a stupid thing, especially when it comes to love.

“I talk a good line, as you can see, about your ma throwing me over for your pa, and of course it makes sense that a girl like her would prefer his majesty over a pirate on the wrong side of the law – even a pirate of the stature of myself. But the truth is--” and I was surprised and a little embarrassed to see tears in his eyes – “it was I who broke off the engagement, like the touchy, over-proud cockerel that I was. I broke it off twenty-five years ago this month, over a foolish kid argument, and I never spent a day without being sorry.”

“Oh,” was all I could think of to say. “Dear. Well, you don’t need to worry about Mother’s feelings – she and Father are deliriously happy and I really do think they’re best friends.”

“Yes.” Long Bob sighed again. “I was afraid of that. And she deserves every happiness the fates please to give her. Ah, well, my life is not such a bad one and it’s pleased I am to be able to do her a service after all these years.

“I see the boats are ready,” he went on with a look over my shoulder, “so I’ll say, till we meet again, young Dulcie. Goodbye is unlucky, as you noticed.”

And with that, our pirate adventure was, at last, concluded.

In Which a Couple of Questions are Resolved

noreply@blogger.com (kathy monahan) — Tue, 17 Aug 2010 16:31:00 +0000

From the diary of Dulcie, Crown Princess of Bentlefay:

(continued from here)

Lynde came hurrying up to me as I shook my paralyzed hand.

“Ow,” I exclaimed. “I never knew a grown man’s groin had so much … bone behind it.”

“It’s my fault,” Lynde said remorsefully. “When we were practicing, I never gave you anything to actually hit. I suppose I thought it was just going to be for fun.”

“It does feel a great deal different from drill,” I admitted. “But the point is, it’s over. And I for one will never be setting foot on a ship at sea again … unless it’s for your wedding.”

“My – oh.” Lynde looked puzzled, and then enlightened. A maidenly blush crept into her cheeks and then ebbed away.

“No – you’re wrong,” she went on softly, gazing across the deck to where Masters was directing operations. “Although, it was … nice, I won’t deny that.”

“It certainly looked nice from where I was standing,” I interjected, but she went on as though I had not spoken.

“It taught me … well, you remember what we talked about the night before we left?”

“Goodness, yes. It taught you that you’re desirable, and by someone who ought to know. He certainly has done you a service, if that’s the case.”

“Yes. But when one is in trouble, one realizes what is most important in life. Captain Masters is an honorable man – a strong leader, and an excellent fighter. But all the time I was locked up in that disgusting little galley – they eat an awful lot of fish on shipboard – I could think of nothing but Tom.”

She sighed. “I’ve been a fool.”

“Well,” I said, “if you can look Masters in the eye and say so outright, you’re a stronger woman than I am.”

Masters himself came striding up at that moment and I added hastily, “I’ll just leave you two alone.”

But they had already forgotten me, and I edged away unnoticed.

Long Bob was attending personally to the strapping up of Bleake’s wrists, and making a meticulously thorough job of it as far as I could tell. Bleake himself had lost the cringing fear he had shown before Masters’ sword point, and was endeavoring to be haughty and above it all.

“Don’t imagine you can keep me prisoner for long,” he sneered when he saw me. “My destiny is for greater things.”

“Listen, it isn’t as though we want you,” I retorted. “It wouldn’t even arise if you didn’t keep trying to conquer us. What on earth do you need with Bentlefay, anyhow? I’ll bet you could have stayed at Norhammer for as long as you wanted and ended up with lands of your own if you’d thought to flatter Duke Harker a little more.”

“A sheltered life as a court lickspittle? No, thank you. Any toady with court manners can find himself a comfortable berth to grow old in. My talents belong on the stage of nations!” A burst of spray flew out of his mouth with the cascading sibilants, and he surreptitiously wiped his chin on his shoulder.

“Well, kingmaking hasn’t worked out so well for you so far, has it?” I said kindly. “Once we get back to Bentlefay I can set you up with some embroidery. We wouldn’t want you to get bored in our dungeons.”

Bleake’s face boiled purple and I would always be sorry not to hear what he would have responded with, but at that moment a sound of roiling water off the port side announced a diversion.

“Ah,” said Long Bob. “We have visitors. Stow this one safely away,” he said to one of his men as he handed Bleake off to him, “but fetch the other one here. We’ve got a bit of a surprise for him.”

Harker was brought between two men, his hands bound and his face still brittle and drawn. Long Bob, at his most expansive, took him in hand.

“Now, your grace,” he boomed. “Some friends of mine have arrived that I want to introduce you to. You’ve never met,” he added with somewhat of a peculiar smile, “though I understand that you think there’s a connection.”

We all went over to the port side of the ship with the manner of a diplomatic entourage, to be met with a sight out of my wildest imagination. Scattered through the water between the Porteous and the Golden Gull, some perched sidesaddle on scaled horselike monsters, some propelled by their own glistening tails, and a few floating on elaborate gilded rafts like royal litters, were the merfolk – dozens of them. They were as impressive as any court caravan I had ever seen and more fantastic than any I could have imagined. I was dazzled.

My own acquaintance Kah-ee-lah was in front and waved at me with a sunny smile. She was even more striking in the bright sunlight and her compatriots looked very like her – dark hair and eyes, blunt slanting features, and dusky brown skin. None of them bothered with any clothing but several of them wore jewels in their hair and around their necks and arms. They looked elementally beautiful, regally proud, and not even remotely like a single one of the Norhammers. I shot a look at Duke Harker, who was opening and shutting his mouth.

“What – who – what – who –” he began.

“This,” Long Bob said with relish, “is the Ah-lo-ah-lee-ee clan of merfolk, and unless I am mistaken, they have something to say to you.”

Six broad-chested mermen pushed forward one of the great rafts, and its occupant, a barrel-chested sage with curly white hair and a diadem of purple shells, lifted an ornate megaphone and spoke in a voice like a roll of thunder.

“Harker of Norhammer,” he said. “I am King Mahi and I speak on behalf of my people. It has been known for generations that your race claims kinship with ours. Until today it has been a cause for our mockery, but now that you have used the claim to justify conquest, it has become a matter of honor.

“Let it be known, Harker of Norhammer and all others of your blood – we repudiate your claim and your actions. Your ships will no longer be tolerated in our waters, and all the tides of the ocean and the four winds of heaven will stand against you. Now, have you any response?”

Harker opened and shut his mouth twice more, and turned furiously on Long Bob. “They can’t all look like that,” he hissed. “They’re nothing like us. They can’t possibly all look like that. What do I say to him?”

“It’s true I haven’t met all of them,” admitted Long Bob easily, “but I must say none of the ones I’ve ever seen could possibly be related to you. I’m thinking they have the right of it, and unless you want to antagonize them further, I’d stick to apologizing for the mistake and thanking them for their time.”

King Mahi had already grown impatient and cleared his throat meaningfully into his megaphone.

“Oh. Yes,” called Harker, and his voice sounded thin and whining by comparison. “Er – I apologize for the mistake, and, er – thank you for your time.”

“Noted,” said the king. “Mind my words, and deliver them back to your people.”

And in a single motion, quick as thought, the entire contingent sank beneath the surface of the water as though sucked through a straw, leaving nothing but a settling mass of foam to mark their passage. We all stared stupidly at it for a moment, and then Kah-ee-lah surfaced briefly by herself, blew Harker a prolonged raspberry, and was gone.

(continued here)

In Which the Day is Saved By ... Well, Everyone Really

noreply@blogger.com (kathy monahan) — Fri, 13 Aug 2010 17:07:00 +0000

From the diary of Dulcie, Crown Princess of Bentlefay:

(continued from here)

There was a pause, and then the four of us went out on the deck, moving in a sort of rigid toddle which I would no doubt have found amusing had I not had a knife to my throat at the time.

The scene on the deck was everything I would have wished. The Norhammers lay about in heaps, either unconscious, bleeding freely, puffy and mottled with bruises, or some combination of the three. The crew of the Porteous, their honor now avenged, was doing most of the tying up, while the contingent of pirates looked on tolerantly, with the exception of Jock Masters, who stood astride a pile of three men with menace in his eye.

“Where is she?” he demanded as soon as he saw us, taking no notice of my plight. “I can’t get a straight answer out of any of these morons.” He gestured furiously at the three men under his feet, who were thoroughly unconscious. “Damn you, tell me where she is or I’ll start slitting their throats one by one.”

“Oh, I don’t think so,” said Harker airily. “Not when every drop of blood shed henceforward by one of my men will be shed three times over by her majesty here.”

Masters cocked an eyebrow and I wondered if that was all that much of an incentive to him. To my relief, however, he strode over to where Long Bob had hold of Bleake and put the point of his sword to Bleake’s throat.

“How about you?” he cooed. “How much of your life’s blood would you like to sacrifice in exchange for three times as much from the princess?”

“She’s in the galley,” shouted Bleake, who then glared at Harker. “For god’s sake, you ass, why do you have to be like that? They were just going to find her anyway.”

I felt Harker shrug. “Not so much a strategist where your own neck is concerned, eh?”

Bleake started forward with murder in his eye and was caught more tightly by Long Bob, whereupon Harker caught me more tightly in response, and my neck was starting to hurt a little before Masters, who had been fumbling with the door of the galley, got it open and Lynde came bounding out like a savage tiger.

She had battle in her eye, but Masters clearly had his own opinion on the matter since he snatched her bodily and planted a toe-curling kiss, which went on long enough for her hands, which were all I could see of her, to register astonishment, impatience, tentative enjoyment, and then enthusiasm.

Those men who were still in possession of their wits looked on in gleeful surprise, and we all would have enjoyed ourselves very much if Harker, who evidently has no sense of romance except insofar as it involves his own personal legend, became impatient and cleared his throat.

“Very touching,” he said smoothly, “but shall we get down to business? I begin to grow weary of this spot of sea.”

Lynde leaped away from Masters, took in the situation with a glance, and then demanded – rather redundantly, I thought – “What does this mean?”

“It means that one may lose all one’s pawns but still win the game if one has the king in check, Mistress Falconer. I have your princess; she will die if you try to take her back. Therefore I must ask you to leave this ship and take yourselves back to Bentlefay along with my ultimatum.”

“And that is?”

“The princess’ hand in marriage and the annexation of the kingdom as Norhammer’s protectorate, or her severed head in a basket before the next full moon.”

He cocked his head in Bleake’s direction. “Oh, and you can take him with you if you like. I have no opinion on the matter.”

Lynde and Masters looked at each other and then at me. I began to realize the seriousness of the situation, which had so far been moving too fast for much thought. Harker was certainly not bluffing – I had all the evidence I needed as to his respect for human life. My breath began to catch shortly as I wondered if I would ever see Mother and Father again, or home. What had I thought was going to be so wonderful about adventure, anyhow?

I was well on my way to hysterics again, with who knows what repercussions, when I became aware that Lynde’s stare held more meaning than I had first given it credit for, and that her lips were moving slightly. It took a moment for me to puzzle out what she meant, but by moving my lips in the same shape I realized that she was mouthing “drill.”

Drill?

Drill!

In an instant Lynde’s plan became clear in my head – the only weakness being that for the first time in my life my safety lay in my own hands, and I was not at all certain I had the courage to defend it.

My mind seemed to move through panic as sluggishly as through mud, but thinking one step at a time I reasoned that if my study of military tactics had taught me anything, it was that to make oneself underestimated shaped any subsequent events to one’s advantage.

I wasn’t sure Harker could estimate me any lower, but to make doubly sure I decided to stage a mock half-faint. With a slight sigh, I made myself as limp as I could, forcing Harker to catch and support me.

“A weak royalty makes a weak nation,” he observed nastily. “And I had thought Bentlefay a worthy opponent. Ah well, at least your farmland is rich.” Bastard, I thought, but dared not move a muscle.

By the second tactical step, Harker needed to have his attention distracted elsewhere. I couldn’t do that myself, of course, but Masters was equal to the occasion.

“Look here,” he began in just the brash rudeness of tone which a bully like Harker would be most likely to respect, “what do you think we fight for? We wouldn’t have lifted a finger against you if we hadn’t been paid handsomely and I for one intend to be paid handsomely to stop.”

“I think you are forgetting –” Harker began but Masters cut him off.

“You may shed as much royal blood as you like,” he sneered, “it has no effect on me.”

“Now then, the princess is our kin,” Long Bob added to the discussion, dividing Harker’s attention further.

“She’s your kin,” said Masters. “If you want to keep fighting, do so by all means, but you’ll be having to fight me too.”

Harker turned his head from Masters to Long Bob and back. It was clear the situation had complicated itself beyond his ability to solve it by threatening me and as my value slackened in Harker’s mind, so did his grip on my throat. I estimated it only needed one more dig to take his mind off me altogether and Masters did not disappoint.

“In any case,” he said, turning back to Harker, “if you are naïve enough to think the pirate clans are respecters of nations, you should leave the sea for your own fishponds until you learn wisdom.”

“Listen, you puppet-king of a gang of no-account ruffians,” shouted Harker, confusion making him angry as it was bound to, “I am a descendant of merfolk; how dare you tell me my place on the sea? I’ll teach you your own place with my bare hands once I’ve done.”

Unconsciously he sketched a gesture with the hand holding the dagger and it was all the opening I needed. Springing swiftly to life, I crouched inside his reach, rammed my left elbow into his gut with all my weight behind it, dropped to one knee and shot my fist into his groin, backed by all the rage that had been building in me since the watch first called at the feast last night.

Harker froze, gave a short high-pitched moan, and toppled magnificently over like a falling tree, to be leapt upon by every available man from the pirate and Porteous crews.

The stalemate was over.

(continued here)

In Which the End Begins

noreply@blogger.com (kathy monahan) — Tue, 10 Aug 2010 16:29:00 +0000

From the diary of Dulcie, Crown Princess of Bentlefay:

(continued from here)

Well, once again the day has been saved, and once again I am unable to determine who in the collective effort has been most responsible for saving it. All I can say is that this time, the deciding action was mine, and I believe I am prouder of it than of anything else I have ever done.

For all of yesterday’s excitement I must have dropped off to sleep after all once I had done writing up my diary, since it was certainly early dawn when a clang and a muttered oath woke me up and indicated that my precautions had not been in vain.

I groaned and sat up, rubbing my eyes. I must be growing accustomed to interlopers in the small hours, since I was hardly even nervous at the time – I only wished the whole thing was over so I could get some real sleep.

“You could have knocked,” I said. “Prisoner or not, this is a lady’s bedroom for the purposes of this journey, and it’s not as though I’m going anywhere.”

It was the fair young giant who last night had held custody of the captain.

“Why on earth would you leave those things there?” he complained. “You made me look like a fool.”

I shrugged. “I dislike being taken by surprise. Besides, you can’t possibly expect me to prioritize for your dignity under the circumstances.”

With the chamber pot disentangled from his foot, the young man set his legs astride in a heroic posture, swelled out his chest and beamed.

“Ah! Intelligence and a sense of humor. You will make an admirable queen for me.”

It was the first time any young man had given a hang about my intelligence and sense of humor and it ought to have piqued my interest, had the assumptions that went along with it not been so sweeping and unwarranted.

I yawned elaborately. “Oh? Are you a king? You hardly look like one.”

“I will be a king as soon as I like,” he snapped. “I am Royal Duke Harker of Norhammer.” He gazed importantly into the middle distance as though waiting for a round of applause.

I giggled. “I wish I had a penny for every deluded nobleman I meet who confidently expects to be king someday. Try again.”

His face became suffused with blood and I wondered if he was going to hit me. But the flush receded quickly and smiled with an effort.

“It is evident that you have not heard of me … I had not thought your country so backward. Ah, well, I have no doubt you will learn very quickly how to treat me once I get you back to Norhammer.”

I leaned forward. “You know, you’re not even the first person Bleake has tried this with,” I said earnestly. “He seems to have an entirely unwholesome view of the position my virginity should have in international politics. I shudder to think what he will come up with once we beat you.”

Harker strode forward and caught me by the arm. “Listen, you little cat,” he hissed. “You have no hope, do you hear? Your Bleake works at my command. My men have this vessel under complete control. No one will even know you are here until your parents receive my ultimatum. So it would be as well for you, princess, if you learned your manners.”

The grip hurt, but at that moment a scuffle and a shout were audible from the deck outside so I was able to smile. “Are you certain?” I asked sweetly. “It seems just as possible that you might be the one who needs to learn your manners.”

Harker actually raised his hand to me at this, but before the blow could connect we heard the clash of steel meeting steel in earnest, and the door flung open to reveal Bleake in a towering rage.

“I ought to have known I’d find you here, you ridiculous cockerel,” he snarled. “It’s those damned pirates. You told me they were gone. Where did they come from? How did they know? By god, I’ll have you flayed for this.”

Harker shoved me away and leaped up to tower over Bleake. “You have me flayed?” he sneered. “You have exactly as much power as I say you have, you puppet. I should have left you back in court; you’re less a bother as my uncle’s lapdog than you are playing at battle.”

At that point the slanging match surged forward high, loud and vigorous, and made a fascinating counterpoint to the clash of the swordfights outside. It was as though each man had touched in the other his deepest vulnerability, and neither of them cared what happened outside in the battle as long as he could best his verbal opponent here within.

I sat spellbound in my bunk, wondering if the whole thing was really going to be this easy. The battle was beginning to subside outside – although the argument was still going strong – when Long Bob strode in with his sword dripping blood and engulfed Bleake almost lovingly in an uncompromising armlock.

“Well, now, your majesty, if your flagship hasn’t got rats on it after all!” he boomed jovially.

I thought the whole thing was over now, but I underestimated Harker. With lightning speed and reptilian agility, he turned, snatched me from my bunk as though I weighed no more than a rag doll, and whipped his dagger to my throat.

“On the contrary, I believe you brought the rats with you, Captain,” he said through gritted teeth. “Shall we step out on deck and parley? I fear it will be an unequal bargain. Your captive, I’ll wager,” and he flicked cold eyes over Bleake, “is not worth nearly so much to me as mine is to you.”

We all stood frozen in silence for three long breaths, then Long Bob lowered Bleake to the floor and stepped back.

“Parley it is, young man,” he said slowly. “Come out -- carefully,” he added, with a meaningful look at me, “and we can assess the situation.”

(continued here)

In Which the Princess Entertains a Guest

noreply@blogger.com (kathy monahan) — Fri, 06 Aug 2010 16:33:00 +0000

From the diary of Dulcie, Crown Princess of Bentlefay:

(continued from here)

I never thought I would sleep after such a day, and indeed spent quite a long time writing up my diary. But by the time the night reached its small hours, I was drooping over the page and thought it might do me good to try and doze for awhile before morning. I was in the fuzzy first-sleep stage in which dreams and reality feel as though they are melting together, and the most cockeyed circumstances seem perfectly normal – which may explain a lot – when I heard the splashing.

At first I thought it was some sort of porpoise or large fish, though I wondered even in sleep why I hadn’t heard any before. But as I came fully awake I realized that the periodic hurling of handfuls of water against the shuttered porthole was not behavior that made sense from a fish, and any doubt that there was sentience at work was dispelled a moment later when a rich, fruity and definitely feminine voice called from just outside.

“Hallo? Hallo, now. I say … oh, what was the name … Hawker? Falconer! Mistress Falconer? Hallo?”

I shot from the bunk as though from a cannon and flung open the shutter.

“Quietly,” I hissed, and was about to go on when my eyes fell on the indeterminate shape in the moonlit water and fell dumb.

The face was like none I had ever seen before – mesmerizingly beautiful, but hauntingly strange, with wide cheekbones, slanting dark eyes, a plush mouth and a broad flat nose. Her skin was dusky, and her hair, coarse and heavy, streamed back wet from the arresting face.

All of this would have been sufficient to attract my attention had I merely been introduced to her normally at the receiving. What overwhelmed me now was that she was not supported by a boat or raft as she dipped and bobbed on the wavelets lapping against the still ship, but by her own unmistakable tail, patterned in the moonlight by iridescent scales and trailing translucent fins like scarves.

A mermaid!

“Ah! Greetings,” she said when she saw me. “You are Mistress Hawker?”

“Falconer,” I corrected automatically.

“Oh yes. Greetings then, Mistress Falconer. I am Kah-ee-lah.”

“But I’m not she,” I added hastily.

“Oh?”

“No, I’m Princess Dulcie of Bentlefay.”

She put her head on one side and repeated “Oh?” in puzzlement.

“Not that it matters,” I amended. “Listen, normally I wouldn’t ask anyone a favor on such short acquaintance.” And I’m not sure you even exist, I added to myself silently. “But you don’t suppose you could take a message for me, could you?”

This appeared to touch off a train of thought in her. “A message!” she cried joyfully.

“Not so loud…”

“I have a message for Mistress Lynde Falconer from Captain Masters!”

Even under the circumstances I paid mental tribute to Masters for being the sort of person who had a mermaid running his errands for him, and wondered irrelevantly if it might not be a quality that would wear thin in everyday life.

“So,” Kah-ee-lah went on, sure of her purpose now, “do you suppose you could fetch her here for me or is there some other window I should try?”

“No!” I could only imagine what the reactions of Bleake and his thugs would be to a mermaid – she would probably be dried and powdered for sale as an aphrodisiac in a foreign port or something equally nasty. “Tell Captain Masters that a terrible fate has befallen us – has befallen Mistress Falconer, actually,” I added, since that was likely to carry more weight.

“This ship has been captured, and we are all taken prisoner. I don’t know where Mistress Falconer is, or if she’s hurt.” In spite of myself my voice trembled. “Please tell Captain Masters and the other two captains to come and help us.”

“Prisoners…” she began meditatively, as though the concept was foreign to her, as it may well have been. “You mean you can’t get out of where you are?”

“That’s right.”

“And even if you could, you wouldn’t be able to swim away, I suppose?” Her tone mingled heartfelt pity and slight condescension.

“…No.”

“So you need the captains to come and help set you free, is that what you’d like me to tell them?”

I wasn’t sure if her manner was an inevitable product of the way mermaids see the world, or if Kah-ee-lah was actually rather silly.

“Precisely.”

She thought for another moment. “I suppose I’d better hurry, then,” she said at length.

“If you wouldn’t mind.” I was not quite able to keep from sounding sardonic, and hastily pulled out my social manner to cover it up.

“It is terribly kind of you to help us. I do hope we are able to speak at more length when we meet again.” If we meet again, I could not help thinking.

Her smile was like a treasure box of pearls. “Oh, yes.” She inclined her head confidentially. “I am a princess too, so we will no doubt have much to talk about.”

“…No doubt.”

“Oh, by the way…”

“Yes?”

“Should I tell the captains who has captured you, or doesn’t it matter?”

“It probably doesn’t,” I said with amusement, “but tell them it’s Norhammer and they’ll understand.”

Kah-ee-lah made a grimace of disgust so pronounced that I could see it even in the moonlight flickering off the water.

“Norhammer!” she said. “Typical.”

And with a flash of her shimmering scales and a flick of her tail fins, which splashed me slightly across the face, she was gone.

Naturally I wasn’t going back to sleep after that, so I went back to my diary and set the whole scene down in black and white. Even so, it has taken on such a tinge of unreality that I now don’t quite believe it happened. If it did, though, tomorrow should be an interesting day.

(continued here)

In Which the Tables are Turned Rather Neatly

noreply@blogger.com (kathy monahan) — Tue, 03 Aug 2010 12:37:00 +0000

From the diary of Dulcie, Crown Princess of Bentlefay:

(continued from here)

Lynde and I had both frozen at the same time and now turned slowly around in mechanical unison. The ship’s complement was assembled in a travesty of its earlier military order. The crew stood in rows with their hands bound before them and gags in their mouths, overseen by a complement of large blank-faced men with fair hair and northern features.

The four men of our bodyguard had evidently been plucked silently and hit on the head one by one as they reached the top of the ladder, and now lay in a limp pile – breathing, I was relieved to see, but unmistakably unconscious.

The captain had been bound and gagged similarly to his men, but had been honored with a guard of his own: a strapping young godling, his chest almost as broad across as Long Bob’s, and with the beauty of one born at the morning of the world. He held a wicked long dagger to the captain’s throat, and the cockiness of his grin was in direct proportion to the outrage that bubbled up through the captain’s gag.

All this was assessable at a glance, and then a short, slight figure of a man stumped forward followed by a cloak that was slightly too long for it. His shoulders were narrow, his middle swelled out in a modest paunch, and he had knock knees, but as much as I wanted to find him ridiculous, his very frailties made the scene seem more grotesque. The slight flickering lamplight turned his knobby features and greasy scant hair into a mask, from the midst of which his eyes glittered with the madness of hate and triumph.

I had never seen him before, but I knew who he was before he said his name.

“Mortimer Bleake, your majesty.” He sketched an ironic bow. “I would add that I am at your service, but as you can see, you are rather unmistakably at mine.”

He glanced at Lynde. “Mistress Falconer, I presume. I would congratulate you on foiling my plans for the Marshweather annexation, but the credit is all Hugo’s, I’m sorry to say – now, now, gently, all of you.”

Lynde had made a sudden movement but found herself checked by a couple of burly Norhammers who had materialized at her elbows.

“You disappoint me, Mistress Falconer – surely you didn’t expect me to be taken by surprise again.”

My lips were dry and my heart pounding, but something in me stuck at showing Bleake any emotion.

“I believe I would wait the extra couple of days next time, and take the trouble to get a cloak specially made for you,” I said meditatively. “Looking as though you borrowed your older brother’s rather spoils the effect.”

Bleake did not respond directly to this dig, but his momentary immobility showed me the shot had hit home.

“Very amusing, your majesty – yes, very good,” he said smoothly. “But I would treat the situation with a bit more seriousness if I were you. You see,” he gestured around him, “your protectors are helpless; your conveyance is entirely in my control; and I am now in a position to bargain with Bentlefay for whatever I wish to ask of it…”

He flicked his eyes down to my feet and allowed them to travel slowly back up to my face again.

“…in exchange for your person.”

I could not repress a grue, but managed to turn it into a shrug, which I hoped looked nonchalant. “Surely you are forgetting something, Master Bleake,” I said, thinking of the cannon. “You ought know to your cost that the Porteous is not so ill defended as you seem to think.”

But he only chuckled. “Oh, you mean your relations? They are very well prepared, certainly. I intended to sacrifice the Soenhast, but I grant you that it happened much more quickly than I expected. However, if you look behind you, you will see that now your audience has concluded, they are already on their way.”

I whirled around to see the Blood Wind disappearing into the night, the Gull moving ponderously in the same direction, and the Sad Sarah’s sails flapping into place in preparation for doing the same.

“I should warn you, by the way,” Bleake went on pleasantly, “that if you do anything to attract their attention, your captain will die in a pool of his own blood a moment later.”

“Noted,” I replied through dry lips, and did not trust myself to say any more.

“Now.” Bleake turned to lead the way towards the captain’s cabin, with a slight delay occasioned by his cloak. “I am sure you would like to get some rest after your long ordeal, and to contemplate your position in decent privacy. You will be locked in, of course, but will remain otherwise unmolested. At least until tomorrow morning,” he amended. “Then I will see you again, and we can have a conversation.

“No, no,” he warned as Lynde began to follow me and was caught back again by her two guardians. “I would be fool indeed to allow the two of you an uninterrupted night of planning, and I am sure you will admit that whatever I am, I am no fool. No, Mistress Falconer will come with me. Sleep well, your majesty. We will meet again tomorrow.”

The door closed behind them all and a moment later I heard the clank of a chain and padlock.

I used to think that there was nothing I liked better than being alone, but I see now that such a feeling is completely dependent upon circumstances. Without Lynde in calling distance, without Mother and Father down the hall and a barracks full of guardsmen between me and a stout stone wall, I feel dreadfully, wrenchingly alone.

Well, loath as I am to take any suggestion Bleake might make, it is true that this situation is the occasion for some hard thinking. I dragged a chair and a chamber pot in front of the door to provide me warning if anyone should attempt entrance, and got into bed with my diary. What on earth is going to happen now, I can’t for the life of me imagine.

(continued here)

In Which the Adventure Appears to be Over

noreply@blogger.com (kathy monahan) — Fri, 30 Jul 2010 17:20:00 +0000

From the diary of Dulcie, Crown Princess of Bentlefay:

(continued from here)

As soon as we reached the upper deck, Masters swaggered over to us – I can really put it no other way – looking almost suffocatingly romantic. His coat was off; his shirt was open at the neck; his long black hair was tied back in a queue with one lock tumbling effectively over his forehead. He ignored me completely and went straight up to Lynde.

“Mistress,” he said, still breathing hard from the fight, “you are unhurt?”

In her place I would have been unable to produce any sound but a watery giggle, but she bore up sturdily and gave him a crisp nod.

“Her majesty and I are perfectly safe,” she said and then wavered. “…thanks to you.”

They gazed into each other’s eyes.

“It is my privilege,” he said, and after a moment’s hesitation she gave him her hand, which he kissed in a way which bore no resemblance to the sterile salutations of the court.

I would cheerfully have stood there watching them until they became aware of me, which honestly looked likely to have been hours, but Long Bob cleared his throat with a pointed rumble and they glanced up at him, still handfasted.

“I surely am sorry to interrupt you,” said Long Bob, and he really did sound sorry, “but the Sad Sarah was the closest to Norhammer’s bowshot, and you may want to signal your watch to make certain all is secure.”

Masters looked out toward his ship and then back at Lynde. “Yes,” he said, “I must go. But surely we will meet again?”

“I – I don’t know,” Lynde stammered. “I go where I am needed, you know. Needed by the princess, that is to say,” she added in a hurry.

“Ah.” He raised her hand again, and this time kissed the palm, in a way that made my knees go wobbly just watching it and Lynde herself sway as though in a stiff breeze.

“You will be hearing from me,” he said into her hand, and after a last meaningful look he strode away.

“Young Jock is an excellent earner, and altogether a most rising young man,” observed Long Bob casually to the world at large. “He has no attachments of which I am aware.

“However,” he went on, having made his point, “take a peep over there at all that remains of your enemy.”

Darkness had fallen over an hour ago, but there was a moon, and the burning hull of one of the three vessels provided sufficient illumination to view the scene. The other two enemy ships were already off for the horizon. The Porteous, the Sad Sarah and the Blood Wind hadn’t a scratch on them, and I supposed that the Golden Gull’s cannon had a greater range than whatever Norhammer had planned for us.

I was struck as an afterthought by the fact that we could see no people – just the two ships disappearing into the dark, and the ruined bulk of the third.

“I would have liked to see what they looked like, at least,” I said. “There must have been some survivors of that ship.”

“It’s true that troubles me slightly,” admitted Long Bob. “A cannonball may blow a hole in the hull but it do be physically impossible to kill everyone on board with the same strike. I wouldn’t use them if it did,” he added virtuously. “We must just take extra care – Norhammers are a tricky people at sea, I’m told. Ah, well,” he went on, “I’ll have your men fetched to you. We’d better get you back to your beauty sleep after the day you’ve had.”

He strode off with purpose and I turned to Lynde.

“Now that the whole thing is over, I wish I’d paid a little more attention to it,” I began, but she did not hear me. She was gazing dreamily at Masters in the bow, ordering together the contingent for the Sad Sarah.

I gave it a moment before I spoke again. “You know, when the battle started I had no idea you’d end up one of the casualties.”

She sighed and came back to earth. “It would be very uncomfortable living on board a ship,” she said, “but I admit this whole affair will be nicer to remember than I would have thought a quarter of an hour ago.”

I took her arm and squeezed it. “He did say you’d hear from him,” I said to tease her. “Come, let’s get back to real life before anything irrevocable happens.”

It took a little time, but the four men of our escort finally assembled, breathing hard from the excitement of the battle and rather inclined to wink raffishly and roll their gait. One of them even had his hat on the side of his head. Obviously fighting with pirates agreed with them.

“Sure, your Majesty,” said their leader out the side of his mouth. “We’d better get you back to the Porteous before the old man takes it into his head to do something simpleminded. He must be itching like a bed full of fleas.”

He was unconsciously speaking in a shadow of Long Bob’s brogue, and I grinned. “Aye aye, mate,” I said. “You and the fellows drop our boat off the port stern while I have a chinwag with himself here.”

The escort shuffled their feet and smiled shyly while Lynde cast her eyes ostentatiously toward heaven, and then she shepherded them away and Long Bob and I were alone.

I made my prettiest curtsy and held out my hand. “It’s been a rare privilege to share your table, Captain Langstrom,” I said. “And if the sequel was not according to expectation it was at least more interesting than most after-dinner hours I’ve spent in my time.”

He shook his massive head and looked mournfully at his feet.

“I take it on myself that they managed to sneak up on us like that; I surely do. I’ve got ears in every port in the Nine Kingdoms, and it’s a sore, sad day when Long Bob Langstrom has to face an enemy he hasn’t seen coming.”

He looked so pathetic that I laid my hand on his arm. “But it worked out though, didn’t it?” I pleaded. “Your cannon were just as big a surprise to them as they were to us.”

“Maybe,” Long Bob acknowledged, “but the time will come when we’ll all have cannon, every ship on the sea, and then it’s the old-fashioned ears that will save us in times like these.”

“Well,” I said, not wanting to coddle his mood any longer, “if you insist on borrowing trouble, you’ll never get out of debt – or so my mother says.”

He grinned like the sun coming out. “And a higher authority I can’t imagine.”

There was a companionable silence, unknowingly breached by Lynde, who arrived just then.

“The boat’s down,” she said, “and we’re just waiting for you. If you’re done.

“Please don’t hurry,” she added in the tone that means the opposite.

I was beginning to feel terribly sleepy – a reaction from my hysterics, I suppose. Lynde and the escort got me down the ladder and into the boat, and although the row across to the Porteous can’t have taken a quarter of an hour I believe I actually nodded off.

We were all relieved the thing was over and our escort made the boat fast and nipped thankfully up the ladder with no ceremony at all. It was up to Lynde to boost me up to the deck, and I suppose our guard was thoroughly down because we got all the way up to the deck without the slightest sense of danger before a harsh, grating voice I had never heard before stopped us in our tracks.

“Welcome to my new ship, your majesty,” it said, and my blood turned cold. “I was beginning to think you would never join us.”

(to be continued)

In Which the Agreement is Put to the Test

noreply@blogger.com (kathy monahan) — Tue, 27 Jul 2010 17:28:00 +0000

From the diary of Dulcie, Crown Princess of Bentlefay

(continued from here)

Fortunately, we had warning. Even in the holiday atmosphere of the feast, the captains had too much experience to take down their guard, and I had already been feeling sorry for the “watch” swaying dejectedly about in the crow’s nest of the great ship, although Long Bob assured me over dinner that he and the kitchen staff would have their share of the food if not the merriment.

Now, over the shattered remains of the sweet course, we heard the thudding on the deck that could only be someone running, and the men were on their feet before the watch burst in.

“’Ware!” he gasped out. “Three ships. Norhammer flags. Coming straight at us!”

It was as though he had touched a match to a powder trail. Long Bob roared “To your stations!” and the men shot up the ladder to the deck one by one with the precision of arrows. “Young Dulcie,” he said to me, “stay down here with your escort. I’ll be damned if any harm comes to you in pirate hands!” And he was gone up the ladder himself, with Harker and Masters in hot pursuit, each shouting “My ship!” in an inharmonious counterpoint.

The four men of the escort were on their feet, but not before Lynde. “I’ll protect her,” she yelled at them. “You go fight!”

That confused them and they showed a disposition to argue with her, but she gained her point. “If you four are fighting, they will be less likely to get down here,” she said reasonably, “and if they did get down here, it will be with more force than five of us could overcome in any case.”

So we were alone in the long room of the crew’s quarters, with the crumbs of the feast around us, and I looked around a little dazedly.

“That all happened so fast,” I said. “I suppose fighting is like that?”

“We had better stay by the ladder,” said Lynde. “I want to hear the progress of the battle, and there will be time enough for us to hide under the table if we are boarded.”

It was so typical of Lynde’s practical common sense, with the tail of absurdity at the end, that I burst out laughing and couldn’t seem to stop.

Lynde looked surprised. “I don’t see what’s funny about that. Under the table is an excellent place to hide. It offers excellent facilities for snatching intruders by the ankles, and…” She looked sharply at me. “Oh. No, this is a very inconvenient time for you to have hysterics, your majesty.”

Which made me laugh harder, until she asked me if it would be necessary to throw cold water over me, and I closed my mouth but the laughter seemed to squirt out my nose and my eyes started to water. Finally she sighed, went to the table, and plucked a bottle from one of the cruets. “Here,” she said. “Take a deep breath.”

The vinegar felt like it was shriveling my nose away from the inside, and my eyes were streaming abominably, but at least I stopped laughing.

“There,” said Lynde with exasperated affection. “Honestly!”

“I’b sorry,” I said with my voice all in my nose. “I’b dever had hysterics – I doad dow what habbed to be.”

“Have a napkin,” she said more kindly, and I blew my nose as comprehensively as I could. “I’m sure it will be awhile until they’re within bowshot and we may as well be comfortable.”

Just then there was a barked order from Long Bob, and a momentary silence fell. “I wonder what--” I began, only to be interrupted by a tremendous booming sound which set the ship rocking till we could no longer keep our footing and had to grab for something fixed to keep upright. A bottle fell sideways and rolled who knew where, and a sprinkle of debris pattered down on the table and our heads. I wondered if it would be inappropriate for me to have hysterics again, but Lynde remained unperturbed.

“Cannon,” she said in an interested voice as she held on for dear life to a spar. “I have heard of them, but never seen them in use. Your relations are ahead of the fashion, your majesty.”

The ship took an unconscionable time to stop swinging, but at last we were able to let go of our supports and brush the dust out of our hair.

“Well,” said Lynde with the air of someone making the best of things, “that’s a convenience. I couldn’t imagine what kind of back-and-forth we would have with arrows in the middle of the sea.”

Long Bob barked again and we grabbed our supports. This time we were prepared for the boom but it seemed even louder, and I wondered if it were possible for the Golden Gull to be broken apart that way, and if it were, would it take very long to drown.

Lynde seemed to be thinking along much the same lines. “I’m certain we will have won the battle with that round, as long as we stay afloat,” she said brightly.

I stuck my tongue out at her. “If all you can do is be cheerful I wish you’d shut up,” I said. “You sound like a nanny.”

“All right, so long as you can manage not to have hysterics again,” she said unperturbed. “In that case, I’m sure if the water is cold enough it will take us practically no time to drown.”

“That’s more like it.”

The ship was still swaying and we had not yet let go of our supports when Long Bob came clattering down the ladder. “All’s well, miladies!” he chortled with high good humor. “One of their vessels is taking on water fast and the others are headed toward the horizon. Masters is keeping his eye on the matter by spyglass, but I’m not worried – they’d no idea what hit ‘em.”

“I don’t even think we have a single cannon in Bentlefay,” I said. “You’re ahead of your time.”

“Well,” Long Bob said modestly, “it’s all in the way of business. An investment, you might say. Would you care to come up on deck? There’s no danger now.”

(continued here)

In Which Apologies Are Made

noreply@blogger.com (kathy monahan) — Mon, 26 Jul 2010 03:59:00 +0000

Hi all-

The archivist was absent this weekend at a very important historical conference and was unable to update on Friday. However, everything is now back to normal and you can tune in Tuesday for the next installment of the Norhammer Conflict. Thanks for stopping by, and we hope to see you Tuesday!

In Which the Hospitality of the Pirate Kin is Put to the Test

noreply@blogger.com (kathy monahan) — Tue, 20 Jul 2010 16:40:00 +0000

From the diary of Dulcie, Crown Princess of Bentlefay:

(continued from here)

The feast, as it turned out, was to be the main event of a longer programme. Apparently the last respectable person to have set foot on the Golden Gull was Mother, and since that was twenty years ago and counting, Long Bob and the other chiefs were ready to put on a show while they had a captive audience.

First there was a sort of music and dancing exhibition put on by a few of the younger seamen – I say “sort of” because while they were certainly issuing sounds from a bagpipe and a flute, and moving their bodies to the aforementioned sounds, none of it bore any relationship to dancing and singing as we practice it back in the capital. They did things with their feet that I couldn’t even describe, to the extent that I was able to distinguish separate movements of their feet in the first place, and the music was a queer, plaintive chant with the tempo of a happy song and the key of a sad one. It was very stirring, but I was glad when it was over.

Then there was an exhibition in the rigging which was rather wasted on me but which had the four men of our escort looking green and defensive. The crewmen seemed to flicker through the rigging as effortlessly as though they were walking on solid ground, and the ropes and flags rose and fell like magic on Long Bob’s barked command. They moved in such precise concert that I found myself on the verge of the trance state which comes upon me when I watch soldiers on parade and had to pinch myself surreptitiously to keep alert.

Finally, with the crew once again lined up on the deck, the captains took us on a tour of the ship. We had experienced the hospitality of the Porteous for a few days already, and while it was acknowledged to be the jewel of the fleet, it couldn’t even approach the amenities available on land. I couldn’t imagine what a pirate ship would have to offer in comparison, and braced myself to smile and be polite about it no matter what they showed me.

But the Golden Gull is more than the flagship of a fleet, it is home to a dozen men who don’t set foot on dry land more than a few times a year. The number of conveniences that could be crammed into a small space and then built in, fastened down or folded away was beyond my reckoning. The galley alone seemed to have everything Tess had in her kitchen at home, and it wasn’t a quarter of the size. The men slept below deck in hammocks, but their possessions were slung neatly in nets overhead or shut away in low lockers against the inside of the hull.

Long Bob didn’t show us everything – no mention was made of weapons or an armory, and I didn’t ask – but it was enough for me to rearrange everything I had assumed about pirates and seafaring. He kept my hand tucked in his arm solicitously the entire time “so I wouldn’t take a tumble in that pretty dress,” and Lynde, to my great joy, found herself commandeered by Masters as grandly as any court lady by her gentleman, and led about with a courtliness that made her fighting leathers and short sword look foolish.

The last part of the ship we were shown was Long Bob’s own quarters in the stern, which were lavish with brass fittings and polished hardwood, and as much like the captain’s quarters on the Porteous as a bouquet of roses to a dandelion seed. There was a shutter, not a porthole, and a curious ledge outside about two feet wide and one deep.

“How curious – it’s like a little seat,” I said before I thought. “Who on earth would want to sit outside your window?”

Long Bob looked at me quizzically.

“Well, when one of the mermaids comes up for a chat, it’s only polite to make her comfortable, just as you might any honored guest.”

The joke seemed a labored one, but I laughed politely and filed the ledge away with the armory as a pirate secret I wasn’t allowed to be told.

“Now then,” Long Bob went on with a twinkle in his eye. “I hope you’re hungry.”

“Starving!” I exclaimed, and we all trooped below deck for the feast.

The crew’s quarters had been stripped bare, the hammocks taken down and the whole place scrubbed white. A long narrow table had been set up down the middle for the crew, with a short table set on it like the crossbar of a T for the captains and guests. The tables were already groaning with tureens of soup, decanters of wine and rum, loaves of bread in every shape imaginable and gleaming jams and jellies. On the head table was an enormous and perfect whole fish, with discreet grill marks on its side and transparently thin slices of lemon draped over it at intervals. It was like an illustration in a book.

Long Bob made another elegant bow and handed me into my place with his best court manner. Lynde sat on his left with Masters on hers – I think the place had been meant to be Herring’s, since he looked surprised when Masters nipped into it, but Herring came quite philosophically to sit on my right, and the four men of our escort sat at the long table with the crew. The crew was standing at attention again to allow us to get to our seats, but their eyes were on the table just like mine were, and Long Bob didn’t keep them long.

“Fellows,” he said, “this is a historic day. We’re going to fight on the respectable side for a change, and never for a worthier cause. In honor of Princess Dulcie of Bentlefay and the glory of her house, I dedicate this feast!”

There was a cheer, and then a great scuffling as the men flung themselves into their seats, and then nothing but the slurping of soup, the sawing of bread and the clinking of spoons. Long Bob and the other two captains devoted themselves in a similar fashion to the activity of eating, so I really didn’t see why I shouldn’t follow suit.

The feast was divine. There is nothing in the world so deceptively simple as soup: easy to make, but almost impossible to make superlatively. This was superlative soup, accompanied by the queen of chewy yeast breads, and followed by the brave fish that had given its life in the cause of diplomacy. I wondered what they would do for a main course – surely there weren’t facilities on a ship for the large-scale roasting of meats? – and was interested to discover that it was sausages: humble as a rule, but glorified in this instance by the nobility of the boar from whence they came and their delicate infusion of spices.

There was an interval, while we lay back in our chairs and toyed with some salted nuts in preparation for the sweet course, and finally, the sweet course itself, a witches’ brew of sweetened cream, rare fruit and the thinnest and most tender layers of pastry. I have never enjoyed a meal more.

The dishes had been taken away and the last thimblefuls of wine were trickling mellowly into our glasses, when the adventure started.

(continued here)

In Which the Agreement is Made

noreply@blogger.com (kathy monahan) — Fri, 16 Jul 2010 20:57:00 +0000

From the diary of Dulcie, Crown Princess of Bentlefay:

An adventure sounds like a nice thing to have, and I hope that once it’s over I shall be in a position to remember it fondly, but just at the moment there’s no guarantee of that – quite the contrary, actually. I am trying my best to be very calm and logical about writing it down, but I don’t feel at all that way inside. One never thinks about that sort of thing when one hears the old stories.

We had no inkling of what might happen when we went over to the Golden Gull at sunset – me in my best, Lynde in her leathers, and four large and musclebound seamen in their dress uniforms. The captain seemed back in the swithers about letting me go, but there being nothing he could do about it short of putting me in restraint, which would get him in even more trouble, he bowed stiffly over my hand and stood on the deck radiating disapproval as we climbed down to the boat.

A rope ladder is not the easiest situation to negotiate in a court dress with a train, but at the slight sacrifice of my dignity I kept it out of the way long enough to tip ignominiously into my seat. The rowers got us to the Golden Gull in double-quick time, which made Lynde turn a bit green around the gills but which, as I explained to her, at least got it over with quickly. She didn’t seem to quite see that bit of philosophy, but we were there before she had the chance to give it too much thought.

We could see Long Bob’s immense beard smiling at us from the deck as we bumped up against the side. “Halloo!” he bellowed. “Drop a ladder for our guests, boys!”

“Me and Jemmy will go up first,” said the leader of our escort grimly. “If we don’t holler safe, Seamus will pull like hell back to the Porteous, and give the alarm.”

But of course he “hollered safe” right away, although he sounded a little disappointed about it, and we made the boat fast and Lynde went next so she could haul me aboard. I didn’t want to depend on our hosts for that, and I didn’t want too much shoving from behind on the part of Seamus and his mate, but with Lynde at the top of the ladder to grab me by the arms I was able to clamber on board with a bit more grace than I had displayed on the other end.

I brushed down the front of my dress and Lynde arranged my train behind, and when the last two of our escort had swarmed up behind us, we went forward to the receiving party.

The three captains were there, of course, and I was interested to see that Masters had thought it was worth dressing up a little more for this part, with a fine linen shirt and a blue coat instead of a brown one. The Gull’s crew was lined up in rows just like the Porteous’ had been this afternoon, and I wondered if that was habitual for pirate crews or if Long Bob had been more impressed by his reception than he had made himself out to be. Pirates do not wear uniforms, of course, so the effect was not as tidy as it was on the naval ship, but the gay individuality of their working clothes certainly made them more interesting to look at.

“Good evening, young Dulcie,” said Long Bob. “You honor us with your company, and I can promise you won’t regret it.” He turned to the ranked men. “How about three cheers for the princess, boys?”

And cheer they did, full throated and gleeful, flinging their fists into the air. At the end of the cheer they scattered back to their business, some climbing cat-like into the rigging and some disappearing below deck. Just the three captains remained, and Long Bob stepped forward.

“Did you bring the treaty, young Dulcie?” He was uncharacteristically solemn, and I gestured to Lynde, who opened the pouch at her waist and brought out the scroll. Long Bob read through it, and handed it to Herring, who made a long job of it before finally wiping his forehead and handing it to Masters. Masters read it, handed it back to me, and stepped back expectantly.

Long Bob proceeded to astonish Lynde and our contingent by taking out an immense horn-handled dagger with a wickedly sharp tip. Mother had told me what to expect, but I didn’t know the knife would be so large, and I’m afraid my apprehension showed. The leader of our escort hissed his breath in between his teeth and Lynde moved as if to stand in front of me.

“It’s all right,” I said quickly, and was disgusted to find that my voice had gone away into my head. “It’s all right,” I said again, normally. “This is part of the ceremony.”

So Lynde fell back and the escort drew in around me, and Long Bob took my finger and pricked it with the very tip of his knife with the tenderness of someone changing a baby. There was another gasp when everyone saw the blood, but Long Bob ignored them.

“Excellent,” he said, and I made a fingerprint in blood on the scroll. “Hook!”

Herring came up with a bottle of spirit and a clean rag and fussed over my hand, and then Long Bob pricked his own finger and did the same thing, and then Herring and Masters in their turn.

“There, now,” Long Bob said. “With that out of the way, we can have ourselves a feast!” And the other two captains nodded and smiled as though the feast was what everyone was here for, and we all knew it.

(to be continued)

In Which the Princess Meets Some Relations

noreply@blogger.com (kathy monahan) — Tue, 13 Jul 2010 17:21:00 +0000

From the diary of Dulcie, Crown Princess of Bentlefay:

Heavens! I’ve certainly been welcomed with all the panoply of the pirate kin – and quite a panoply it is!

They were already at anchor when we hove into view, and what a festival of flags and bunting, and colorful paint and costumes they were, in comparison with the drab and uniform utility of the navy. There were three of them: two sizable barks, and an immense flagship, a little distance apart, so that when we hove up ourselves we made quite a little archipelago in the middle of the open water.

I will say for our captain that although regulations constrained him from competing in the matter of flags and bunting, he was not to be outdone in clean maneuvers and naval etiquette. We barreled stoutly at them until I thought the captain had fallen asleep, and then he barked out an order. There was a great sound of flapping in the rigging, and we suddenly seemed to curtsy, swerve, and edge up into the archipelago almost completely sideways on. The captain barked again; we glided to a halt, and the sailors slid out of the rigging and down the mast with the smartness of acrobats, to stand at attention in rows on the deck.

The flagship dropped a boat, and their boarding party came gliding up with two sweating sailors toiling away at oar, two passengers sitting squarely and with dignity in the stern, and a giant of a man standing astride the bow, with his legs taking the motion of the boat occasionally, but otherwise with no concession to the fact that he was not standing unconcernedly on land.

They made fast to our side and swarmed up the ladder with the grace and alacrity of men for whom the presence of a ladder cannot be relied upon when boarding a ship not their own. First the oarsmen, to stand at attention on either side of the ladder, then the pair from the stern, and finally the giant, who identified the players of importance in a half-second glance and strode forward.

He ignored the ranked seamen, gave a correctly modish nod and a brief “sir” to the captain, and came directly to me and took my hands in his.

“Ah, now if it isn’t little Dulcie after all these years,” he said in a resonating velvet voice rather like Father’s, except that Father’s is definitely golden and this was much more of a rich mahogany. “Sure, and I would recognize you anywhere by your resemblance to your ma.”

It was in every way the behavior of a long-lost uncle, and I wondered if he was one. He seemed the right age to be Mother’s contemporary, he had obviously known her well, and he certainly had her unconventional social grace – it wouldn’t surprise me a bit if that turned out to be inherited. He looked even larger up close, overtopping even Lynde by half a head, so that I only came up to about the middle of his chest and had to crick my neck to look at him. His muscles were superb, his clothing was as various as motley, his luxuriant black hair and beard were curled into careful ringlets and on his head was an immense black hat which, after releasing my hands at the end of a prolonged and almost painful squeeze, he swept off and made an elegant bow over one leg.

The captain, who had been as jumpy as a cat the entire journey at the thought of running across pirates on purpose, cleared his throat in a disapproving manner. “The princess will not know your name, any more than I do,” he remarked distantly, “sir.”

The giant looked astonished. “Sure and I’m Captain Robert Langstrom of the Golden Gull – Long Bob Langstrom that was childhood sweethearts with her blessed ma before ever his majesty entered the picture. The little lady will surely know me from my description.” And he beamed – which put me in a bind, of course, since while Mother had certainly told me who I was going to be meeting, and mentioned on more than one occasion her childhood sweetheart Long Bob Langstrom, to say that I had known anything about what to expect would have been wildly overstating the case.

So I said the only thing I could, which was “Oh, yes,” and smiled my widest. “Of course, Mother talks about you all the time. I knew you immediately. Thank you so much for agreeing to receive me.”

I thought by the end that I was beginning to overdo the emphasis but Long Bob seemed accustomed enough to emphasis where he was concerned and began to coruscate visibly.

“There now, you see?” he said, dealing the captain a friendly buffet on the shoulder, which made him sway though he caught himself from stumbling. “We are all family here.”

He turned back to his attendants. “This is your great-uncle, Captain Jem Herring of the Blood Wind.” He indicated a short, tubby man in a wildly eclectic garb, each component of which was new and clean and obviously intended for state occasions, but which seemed to have nothing to do with the whole. There were dimples in every corner of his round face, and one of his legs was missing from the knee and had been replaced with a peg. He limped forward to squeeze my hands in his turn.

“Blessed day for us to see you here, young Dulcie,” he said. “Your ma was the apple of our eye since she was a baby.”

“And this is Captain Jock Masters of the Sad Sarah, your second cousin once removed.” Captain Jock was almost as tall as Long Bob but nowhere near as broad, and much younger than the other two – about thirty, I thought. He was very handsome in a ruffian kind of way: dark and picturesque but with unexpected pale gray eyes that made him look like a brooding eagle. He was dressed for utility rather than show, but he looked so distinguished in himself that his clothes seemed distinguished by association. He bowed over my hand with an offhand courtesy.

“Your majesty,” he said, and then surprised everyone by looking over my shoulder and bowing to Lynde, who was wearing her fighting leathers and standing at attention.

“Mistress,” he said with courtesy infinitesimally less offhand, and his eagle eyes softened into a smile. I heard Lynde give a slight gasp – ever since we hove in, even the captain had treated her like one of his own men, and neither Long Bob and Jem Herring had acknowledged her at all – but she collected herself in a moment and gave a cool military “sir,” which seemed to satisfy Masters for the time being.

“Now,” said, Long Bob, “we can take you over to the Golden Gull and get this signing business over before the feast.”

Our captain didn’t like that. “My orders did not include allowing the princess to leave the ship,” he said. “I am afraid that any business you have with her will have to be conducted here.”

Long Bob looked at the captain from his great height, and in his silence seemed to gain menace. Herring and Masters stood quietly and at ease, and Herring even twinkled a little. I had the feeling he wanted to wink and couldn’t.

Our captain stood straight and looked Long Bob in the eye, but he was sweating lightly in spite of the breeze, and the tension in the air was palpable. I saw one or two of the seamen exchange glances, and the officers were looking definitely concerned by the time Long Bob spoke.

His great voice was gentle and courteous, but it was immediately evident that there would be no compromise. “Sure and I’m sorry to put you in such a bind, captain,” he said. “But I’m afraid that isn’t going to be an option. Our rules are very strict on that point, and I represent a great many men who would not be willing to put themselves in danger for a monarchy that didn’t have trust in them.”

The captain clearly didn’t know how to handle the situation – his distrust was plain, and he obviously assumed that I’d be taken for ransom in the blink of an eye, but it was no part of his orders to keep me from signing a crucial treaty. I decided it was time for me to weigh in.

“Of course I’ll go,” I said. “These are my kin. You’ve no need to worry.”

The captain cleared his throat. “If those are your orders, your majesty, then they must be carried out. But I insist on augmenting your bodyguard with at least four of my own men.”

Long Bob thumped the captain on the shoulder again and broke into a hearty laugh. “Bless you, man, there’s plenty of room and enough food for a platoon. You’re invited yourself, and as many men as you’d like. I’ll wager you’ve never sat up to a pirate feast before – it’s something to remember!”

So we are to go over to the Golden Gull at sunset, in our own boat with the requisite four men. The captain chose to stay – he still hasn’t convinced himself that his vessel won’t be swarmed while he is over there, but on the other hand it is evident that he will be on pins and needles for every moment I am out of his sight. It’s a difficult situation and I feel for him, but needs must – and in any case, I can’t imagine that anything will happen to me over there. They obviously worshipped Mother, and they certainly wouldn’t bring harm to one of their own.

In Which Lynde Sees a Bit More of the World

noreply@blogger.com (kathy monahan) — Fri, 09 Jul 2010 17:41:00 +0000

Lynde Falconer to Master Owen Falconer:

Dear Father,

Well, here we are in Seaward, and while the journey has been full of interest, I am saddened when I remember how much farther I am from you.

We left the day before yesterday, an hour after dawn. We would have left at dawn, only Lady Winifred Fleem had to get married first. Lady Winifred is – was, I should say – the princess’ principal maid of honor, and it is difficult to imagine what the court will be like without her. Her engagement to Sir Bardolph Hingle was a shock to everyone, announced only the day before, but now that I think about it, it was brewing for a long time. The king performed the ceremony, the wedding breakfast consisted of bread and cheese in the saddle, and we were on our way by the time the sun was over the tower.

The landscape in the south is very different from the trip north to Dumcruckle. Our hills are gray and jagged, but theirs are round and green, and the farming is done on a scale to make you open your eyes. There are no patches of cultivation hewn out of the rocks as we have in the north, but smooth tilled fields for as far as the eye can see. You are probably not plowing yet, but the weather is softer here so it is almost time to sow, by my reckoning.

We stayed the first night in the town of Durrell, but yesterday brought us to the Grange, which is Sir Bardolph’s new house on the way to Seaward. His face when he brought his bride into his home was beaming like the sun itself. Lady Winifred is a bit of an armful, but he insisted upon carrying her over the threshold, and managed nobly to behave as though his burden was as light as a feather. Lady Winifred, however, is a born courtier, and managed to identify the precise moment when the needs of his pride gave way to the needs of his lower back, and made him put her down.

The entire household was standing in the hall at attention to receive their new lady, with the steward and housekeeper in front, looking apprehensive for some reason. Sir Bardolph gave a brief and correct speech introducing his bride, and everyone clapped politely, then Lady Winifred herself gave a longer speech, after which they clapped enthusiastically, and finally they introduced the princess, which made them all gasp, and the steward started to get down on his knee and said something about them being her humble servants.

“Oh, nonsense,” said the princess, and they all gasped again. “No, really. Bentlefay has citizens, not servants. Please treat me like any other guest, or I shall feel terribly lonely.”

So they smiled, and the steward got up, and we were shown to our rooms. The Grange is only a few years old, so of course it is in the newest style – a manor, not a keep, low and wide to the ground with no fortification. The rooms are similarly low and wide, large enough to be comfortable but not so vast as to be drafty, and with wide plank floors instead of flagstones, covered with richly colored rugs. There is an impression of wood and fabric instead of stone and steel, which I enjoy very much.

The Grange is very close to Seaward so we did not leave until after noon. Our parting from Lady Winifred was very emotional and the princess came closer to tears than I’ve seen her since the last war. She has pledged to come stay with us at least once a season, and Sir Bardolph backed her up, so it is only “until we meet again.” It was an easy couple of hours to Seaward, and the next leg of the journey.

I suppose it is something to be able to say that one has been to sea, and perhaps I will think so someday, but just at present I am not enamored of it. It is certainly picturesque, and the ships are impressive – there is quite a ceremony about boarding, especially when the royal family is involved. We won’t actually push off until tomorrow, but if that ceremony is half as grand as the coming on board, I will have had a lifetime’s share of pageantry. I ought to have enjoyed it, but all I could think about at the time was my stomach, and whether I could prevent myself from being sick, and if one’s face could actually turn green or if that was just a turn of phrase.

The princess was soon running about the nasty old bucket as though she had grown out of it – which I suppose she has, in a way, being of the pirate kin as she is. I asked if I could see our quarters, but the mate took one look at me and said that it was best to be on deck if I felt poorly, so I must have looked green after all. He was very kind and explained it to me carefully: that the fact of motion is only part of what can make you sick, and if you subject your stomach to the motion while your eyes think you are still (by going down to your quarters, for instance), it would be much worse.

He also said it would get better, which I’m afraid I didn’t believe, but sure enough I had got used to it in a few hours – sufficiently for the mate to allow me below, at least. I must say that the living conditions on board a ship leave much to be desired. This one is said to be a marvel of modern comfort because the men have bunks instead of hammocks, and the captain has a cabin of his own, which is apparently unheard of. He has given the cabin to us, which is fortunate, because there is no other, and we would be living in the hold if the ship had been of the old style. I thought the captain’s cabin would hold all the possible comforts that the ship had to offer, and so it does. Unfortunately, that isn’t saying much. We have a bunk, a chest, a table, a chamber pot – and that is all.

I will give this to the messenger tomorrow before we push off. We should only be at sea for a few days if everything works out as expected, so I will try to send you an account of our journey by the end of the week.

Your loving,
Lynde

In Which More Than One Journey Begins

noreply@blogger.com (kathy monahan) — Tue, 29 Jun 2010 17:18:00 +0000

From the diary of Dulcie, Crown Princess of Bentlefay:

The capacity of life to surprise me is beginning to grow rather wearying, although I suppose if I were a more optimistic person I would find in it a source of interest. Winnie, for instance, has been with us since I was a tiny child and I thought that if there were a single person in the world outside my own family whom I knew inside and out, it would be her. Imagine my astonishment, then, when she told me yesterday with a straight face and a hint of a blush that she was going to marry Sir Bardolph the following morning, travel down with us as far as the Grange, and stay there with him for the rest of her life.

I’m afraid the news rendered me rather stupid for I gaped at her until she crossed her arms and gave me a look.

“I didn’t expect you to be pleased, but I wouldn’t mind some slight acknowledgement.”

I blinked. “I beg your pardon, Winnie, I thought for a moment that you said you were going to be married.”

She flapped her hands at me. “You heard me perfectly.”

“But married women are meant only to sleep with their husbands.”

“Yes, I picked that up through observation,” she said dryly.

“Well, it just seems very unlike you.”

Winnie sighed, and an expression of extreme beatitude spread over her face. I’ve seen the look on newly engaged people before, and prepared to have my stomach turned.

But all she said was “I don’t think I shall find it difficult, believe it or not,” and I immediately felt rather cheap.

“Oh, Winnie,” I cried, clasping her hands. “I am so, so pleased for you and I wish you every happiness, but I’m going to miss you so much.”

She gathered me into her arms just as she had when I was seven years old and having nightmares, and we sobbed comfortably together for a moment or two.

“I’ll miss you too, child,” she said at length. “I’ll miss all of you. But look at you – you’re presiding over the court; you’re taking part in councils and tactics; you’re going on diplomatic missions. You’re ready. You don’t need me anymore, and Dolph does. When you see him again he’ll look ten years younger and his gout will be gone; just you wait.”

In the face of losing her I felt that I would always need Winnie, and hated Sir Bardolph and his gout. But she has given as much of herself to the kingdom as anyone, and more than most. She deserves Sir Bardolph’s gout if that’s what she wants.

“Be happy,” I mumbled, and dried my eyes surreptitiously on her dress. “I don’t know anyone who deserves it more.”

So Winnie and Sir Bardolph were married this morning, and a most sentimental event it was, regardless of the early hour, the hurried ceremony and the fact that we were all wearing riding clothes except Mother and Father who were wearing dressing-gowns. Father performed the ceremony, and I was maid of honor, with Mother and Lynde for witnesses. Winnie gave the responses very surely, in a sweet carrying voice, but Sir Bardolph wept without stopping through the whole thing, and could barely choke out the responses at all. Of course that set Father off, and the two of them blubbered on until I heard Lynde begin to sniffle too, at which point Mother could no longer stifle a laugh, and I laughed too, and that worked.

As soon as the ceremony was over we started for Seaward, and as the dust of Bentlefay city fell away from our feet, my spirits rose. We have a full retinue of bodyguards and give quite the impression of steel and muscle, but there are no courtiers and no pageantry, and I am beginning to feel free for the first time since my debut. My feet are no longer mired to the ankles in silk trains, and my hands no longer fettered by the princesses’ misbegotten tapestry. I thought I knew how circumscribed my life had become – I complain about it all the time, after all – but this taste of freedom set it in granite.

Of course we don’t camp or anything like that, although I would love to try it; Mother says we will have quite enough of primitive conditions on shipboard, although the new vessel is said to be the best of its kind so I’m not sure what she means. We are with the Lord Mayor of Durrell tonight, and although he is so mellifluous in his diplomacy that I’m not even sure he knows what he’s saying, at least his guest rooms are large and bare and he went to his study after dinner and left us to ourselves.

Winnie and Sir Bardolph said good night a few minutes later, and when I exclaimed at the earliness of the hour, he turned a light puce. Lynde giggled, and Winnie shot me a look.

“My dear Dulcie, we got married this morning.”

“Oh,” I said, not grasping her point.

“That means,” she said with elaborate enunciation, as though I was a child or a foreigner, “that we are on our honeymoon.”

“Oh!” I realized, and no doubt turned puce myself. Sir Bardolph grinned abashedly at me.

“I have been waiting long enough for this,” he said, “and I hope your majesty will forgive me if I say that I’m damned if I’ll wait any longer.”

“My majesty is ashamed to make you wait this long,” I said. “Go with my blessing, you two.”

And they were gone almost before the words were out of my mouth.

Naturally I am as happy as I can be for Winnie. Of course I am. I have a little sour gray imp in my mind about losing her though. Still, it would have bothered me more if I hadn’t got Lynde, and Mother and Father are the best friends anyone could have. That seems to be the way with change – you get a new friend, and you lose an old one. I suppose that’s what they mean by equilibrium, but I find it very tiresome.

In Which Battle Lines Are Drawn

noreply@blogger.com (kathy monahan) — Fri, 25 Jun 2010 17:17:00 +0000

Lynde Falconer to Master Owen Falconer

Dear Father,

I will be addressing my letters to you in the future that I might be certain to communicate my tidings only to those who find it of interest.

We leave in three days for Seaward, where we will take ship for a rendezvous with several representatives of the pirate clans. The queen believes that they can be convinced to behave more or less as a defensive force in cooperation with Bentlefay’s navy, and they are apparently her own family so I suppose she would know, although it seems very unlikely to me. The negotiations have reached a point that they require a representative – some kind of pirate ceremony that pirates do, and it is very important that it be the right kind of person since pirates are very touchy in the matter of honor. The queen is up to her eyes in logistics and the king is apparently a martyr to sea-sickness, a circumstance which has been kept assiduously secret in his public image.

Given all that, it has been decided that the princess will be the one to go to sea and meet with the pirate chiefs to seal the agreement. Her mother says that the change will be good for her, and that it is time she took on some of the more ceremonial tasks of governing. After all, she will be the ruling monarch someday, although of course we all hope that the king enjoys long life.

I saw the logic of all this of course, but there is such a siege mentality here in the castle that I wondered at the queen’s willingness to send the princess out among such questionable characters as pirates.

“Not at all,” said the queen. “They will all be relations of Dulcie’s on the distaff side, so you will see that they cherish her virtue even more than we do. Pirates are like that with their daughters; it was always extremely inconvenient for me – but of course now that I have a daughter of my own I see their point.”

Of course I have never been south of the capital before nor seen the sea in my life, so I am looking forward to the journey with a mixture of interest and trepidation. The princess, of course, is bounding for joy with the whole affair, so we should have a lively time.

I hope you are all well there, and not missing me too much. Tell Master Crowder he is not to consider himself bound in any way. I confidently await news of a new betrothal.

Your loving,
Lynde

----------

From the diary of Dulcie, Crown Princess of Bentlefay

I have finally been able to discover what the matter is with Lynde. This was not due to any detective zeal on my part – I am ashamed to say that I was too full of my own affairs even to think about it until it was thrust upon me.

Of course I have been full to bursting with the matter of going to sea on the mission to the pirate clans. Not only is it something I have always wanted to do, but it sounds impossibly romantic when put that way, and the prospect of being able to actually do something constructive for the war effort instead of standing around uncomfortably makes me feel human again after the past few weeks of helpless impotence.

So it wasn’t until we were almost finished packing that I bustled officiously from my room into Lynde’s in search of a lavender sachet and found Lynde herself slumped dejectedly on the corner of her bed with a packet of letters in her hands and her eyes full of tears.

The picture assorted so ill with her that I was unable to command a response and just stood there with my pop eyes gazing into her tearstained ones for a few long breaths. Then she gave two sharp sniffs and started to cry again, and I found my voice.

“Oh Lynde, what is it?” I cried. “I’m a beast. Is everything all right at home? I’ve been so full of this ridiculous affair that I haven’t even asked you. Here,” I gave her my handkerchief and sat down next to her, “have a good blow and tell me all about it.”

Lynde’s face screwed itself up mournfully.

“It’s Tom. It’s our engagement. I – I don’t think we’re engaged anymore.” She blew her nose and wilted another couple of inches. “Oh, I don’t want to bother you with it. You’ve been so b-b-busy. And it’s so silly,” she added drearily.

I put my arm around her shoulders and gave her a little shake. “Nonsense – out with it.”

So she outed with it, and a more ridiculous, illogical lover’s spat over nothing I have never heard. She showed me his letters and told me everything she had written in hers, and at the end of it I still could not for the life of me determine the cause of the actual problem.

“Well,” I said dubiously when she was done, “I don’t see why you think he gave a rap about your cousin Minnie before, but if your letters haven’t forced him into a closer look he’s a miracle of restraint. Whatever possessed you?”

“I don’t know,” she wailed. “He couldn’t seem to stop going on about how charming she was, and how she admired him, and how close she was to the family. And she’s s-s-small.”

I blinked. “What does that have to do with anything?”

“You see, nobody has ever admired Tom that way but me. Just like nobody has ever admired me but Tom. And I know that I tower over him and could break him in half, but that has never mattered before because it isn’t as though there were anyone else.” She blew her nose again. “But now there is someone. Someone who is dainty, and charming, and likes the same things he likes.”

“So you thought you would drive him away before he left of his own accord?”

“I s-s-suppose.”

“I’ve read about that in bad poetry, but I never thought a human being would be so foolish.”

Lynde looked as though she was about to cry again and I added hastily, “But you know, I think you’ve undervalued yourself as well as Tom. Nobody should get engaged to someone just because you don’t think anyone else would be interested. You’re a beautiful young woman, Lynde, and it’s an awfully big world with a great many men in it. Come on.” I gave her another shake. “We’re going to sea with pirates! Who knows what might not happen?”

She brightened a little. “We are, aren’t we?”

“We are. So you just put those back in your chest and look to the future! Now,” I rose to my feet purposefully. “Where do you keep your lavender sachets?”

In Which Unforgivable Things Are Said

noreply@blogger.com (kathy monahan) — Tue, 22 Jun 2010 18:10:00 +0000

Lynde Falconer to Thomas Crowder

Well, Tom, I suppose it is possible that I have been so long away from home that I am no longer qualified to comment on fashionable etiquette in Dumcruckle, however, here in the capital, where I am sure you must admit the fashions are as current as they can be anywhere, an affianced young man who spends so much of his time in mutual admiration with someone not his betrothed would be looked upon with a raised eyebrow at best. I bow to your evidently superior knowledge, however, and will certainly say no more as it seems to threaten your delicate sensibilities.

Will you be so kind to inform my father that starting in about a fortnight, further communications will not reach me here in the capital for at least the next few weeks and will need to be held? The queen has arranged a diplomatic mission for the princess, upon which I will naturally be obliged to accompany her. I have not yet been informed of its precise nature except that it will involve a sea voyage – not the most secure method of travel in these parlous times, but of course I follow orders. Tell Father not to worry too much, since I will of course not be the princess’ only protection, and in any case it is necessary sometimes to take the risks that are given us so that others may live on in comfort. I will endeavor to do whatever needs to be done with pride and duty, for the honor of Dumcruckle and the Falconer name.

Lynde

----------

Thomas Crowder to Lynde Falconer

My dear Lynde,

I don’t know what it would take to convince you that there is nothing whatsoever between myself and your cousin Minnie, and I suppose a saner man would stop trying. But injustice pains me, and I really do think your position is a very unfair one. Am I to cut myself off from all interactions with women for the length of our betrothal? And will this policy extend to the life of our eventual marriage?

If so, we must certainly give careful thought to the scope of the prohibition. Does it extend to Lady Dumcruckle? Katti? The schoolchildren here? May I ride no female horse, nor pat any hound in the kennel which is not suitably equipped? In that case I believe I am entitled to insist that you show me the same courtesy in the matter of men, and cease any martial activities with the soldiery of the Tower. It may seem an onerous burden, but if betrothal prevents me from casual conversation with a young woman to whom I owe duties of family and hospitality, merely because she troubles herself to be charming about it, then I think it only fair that it similarly prohibit you from your pungent mock-fights with inarticulate and muscle-bound young men.

This whole thing is a farce, and I abhor it. Do, I beg of you, return to your senses so that we may go on as before – both of us.

Tom

----------

Lynde Falconer to Thomas Crowder

Tom,

The reason I do not trouble to be charming, as you put it, is that I thought you were above such posturing nonsense and I consider it an exhausting bore to have to flirt with one’s own husband to keep his eye from straying. I am grieved to hear that my manner is not to your taste, but perhaps it is best that we learn this about each other now, before we do anything irreparable.

You neatly make a fool of me by inflating ridiculous arguments and then puncturing them, but you know as well as I do that they are ridiculous. All I can do is reiterate that the warmth of a betrothed man’s affections is said to belong to his betrothed, and if you prefer to bestow them upon another, then perhaps it is the relationship that should change.

As for the young men whose figures, manners of expression and personal odor you are pleased to mock, I would remind you that they are soldiers serving their country, as am I, and are willing to risk life and limb that you and others like you may continue to mock them safely in our language and not another’s.

As you don’t mention my forthcoming journey, I am forced to assume that you do not attach very much importance to it, but I hope you were able to retain it long enough to give the necessary communication to my father and anyone else who might care.

Lynde

----------

Thomas Crowder to Lynde Falconer

If you think so little of my attachment to you that you really think I don’t care where you go and how much danger you are in, then I am frankly astonished that you accepted my proposal in the first place. But that isn’t the point, is it? You are off to war, and I am living soft among the women, and you look at me from the distance of history’s chosen and wonder why you bound yourself. And it’s true – I am not brave; I do not fight; I sit and read and enjoy myself; while better men assist my own affianced wife to protect me and other such weights on society. Do you think I am not sufficiently galled by this without your reminders?

I am forced to conclude that you say such things either because you know nothing whatsoever about me, or because you no longer care. In any case, you must settle your own future in the way that you think is right; I will not attempt to influence you to continue a relationship you find repugnant.

Tom

In Which the Situation Becomes Serious

noreply@blogger.com (kathy monahan) — Fri, 18 Jun 2010 18:30:00 +0000

From the diary of Dulcie, Crown Princess of Bentlefay

We have had three more raids from Norhammer in the last week, and I have stopped sleeping again. The first one was just like … well, the first one: a patrol ship was attacked at dawn, though this time they were better prepared for it and there was no loss of life. The second was on a couple of fishing boats which managed to outrun them, although the fishermen came away with the firm impression that they were only “allowed” to do so rather than managing it on their own, and only then because their antagonists realized that they carried no weapons beyond a few gutting knives.

The third was the most potentially hair-raising, although it came with at least a touch of gratification: they hit our flagship, the Porteous, in broad daylight as it took the Admiral out to inspect the scene of the fishing boat attack. The Admiral writes that the Norhammers used the same fire-arrow trick as they had on the Vigilant, but since the Porteous was using special sails and retorted with fire arrows of their own, they were able to disable the sails of the enemy ship without suffering too much damage. They were not able to take it into custody, however, since it bristled out about twenty oars, if you please, and escaped out of range, so it hardly counts as a victory.

I ask you, what can one do with an enemy like that? They are forever one step ahead of us for all our preparedness, and seem to have an affinity for sea battles amounting to a magic power. It almost makes me believe that they were descended from mermaids after all, as their appalling legend holds.

Court life has become a ghastly simulacrum of reality since the whole thing began. All my study in military tactics has been for land battles, which renders me utterly useless in this situation, so I can’t even help. I try to sit in on all the councils, but my understanding grows only incrementally less dim, and since nobody has the time to stop and explain things to me, I am not much more than an unwieldy piece of furniture in the council room.

The receiving takes place in a bizarre state of siege, with half the courtiers having fled to their country houses and half the rest toting bodyguards about like lapdogs. More often than not I have been left to run it myself with Winnie and Lynde for support, since Father and Mother’s time is more efficiently spent on national defense. Suppers are glum and silent affairs, and the dancing would be better off cancelled for the duration, in my opinion, consisting as it does of one or two couples revolving valiantly in a sea of silent whisperers, accompanied by dirges from the musicians.

I am trying to keep up on my fighting lessons with Lynde, and would almost enjoy them if Lynde herself had not lately undergone a change in manner – constantly distracted, and going about her day without ever really being there at all. She oversees my lessons with the elaborate care of a children’s nurse, but from what Rafe has let drop I gather that her real practice with the men has not been so innocuous, and one or two men have been hurt.

I tried to confront her about it this afternoon, but I might as well have saved my breath for staying alive. I thought that coming back from my lesson would be a good time for it, since one is generally fairly relaxed in the aftermath of physical activity, and it would have the added benefit of astonishing her that I could talk at all, I hoped.

“You know, you may as well tell me what’s biting you,” I said as casually as I could. “Trouble shared is trouble halved, and who knows – I might even be able to help.”

“I don’t know what you could possibly mean, your majesty,” Lynde answered, and feigned sudden interest in the side of the path. “Look, is that the first crocus?”

“It’s a pebble, and you know it,” I said. “Come now, don’t try that trick with me. I can tell by now when there’s something wrong with you.”

She looked through me and out the other side, and then took what I consider to be a most unfair advantage.

“I think we can start running back to the castle instead of walking,” she went on. “It will help your conditioning.”

“But…” I began, and discovered I was talking to her back, which was receding rapidly into the distance.

So we ran, and as I was unable to formulate any more words for a considerable time afterwards, the discussion was closed.

Confronting people about things was all very well when I was younger and could exploit the perceived advantages of ingenuousness and charm, but I have noticed the technique working less well of late. I shall have to come up with another way to find out what is wrong with Lynde.

In Which Lynde and Tom Behave Rather Stupidly, Considering

noreply@blogger.com (kathy monahan) — Tue, 15 Jun 2010 17:13:00 +0000

Lynde Falconer to Thomas Crowder

Dear Tom,

I do not want to put you to too much trouble, but if you have the opportunity, please tell my father that a new threat to Bentlefay’s sovereignty has arisen in the last few days, this time from Norhammer to our north. I am sorry to cast a shadow over the amusement you and your guests are all enjoying in Dumcruckle at present, but as it is a matter of national importance I hope you will forgive me.

They are attacking us on the sea, where they have already sunk a patrol ship. Lives were lost in that battle, so the capital, at least, is in mourning. There is also a personal element to the whole affair in that it seems to have been instigated from within by our old nemesis Mortimer Bleake, who has apparently obtained a position of confidence in Norhammer’s court and is using it for the sake of vengeance.

The situation is very tense and worrisome; however, at least it will be addressed from Seaward by the navy, so you will not be put to any trouble in the matter this time. Once again, I apologize for bringing the outside world into what appears to be a very cozy new circle, but I thought you should know how it is with us at court, in case anyone is interested.

Yours very truly,
Lynde

----------

Thomas Crowder to Lynde Falconer

Dear Lynde,

This is very distressing news, and all of us here are most anxious at this
new threat to Bentlefay, as well as at the effect it must be having on you personally. Regardless of the idyllic ignorance of which you seem to accuse us, your importance to national security is never far from our minds here.

But I am at a loss to understand why you write so coldly. If it is the new state of war which puts you under strain, please be assured of the regard and support of your family and friends. Mistress Rebecca says to tell you that any race which indulges in steam baths, as she has heard is the fashion in Norhammer, should be easy to defeat in their softness by a cold-bath soldiery such as ours. Minnie thinks that if Bentlefay’s fighting men have half the courage of its schoolmasters, then the war will be won by the time you get this letter. Of course she is biased, but it made me laugh, so I hope it will similarly lift your spirits.

Your own,
Tom

----------

Lynde Falconer to Thomas Crowder

Tom,

I am sorry if you found my letter cold, but you must admit that the tidings do not lend themselves to the charm to which you appear to have become accustomed. In any case, I supposed you were getting all the warmth you needed from my young cousin, and since according to your letter I was correct, it surprises me that you would notice anything lacking in me. To feign cheerfulness is a burden at present with the political situation so serious, but I will endeavor to alter my behavior in the future to something more to your taste in a wife. You must send me a list of the things my cousin says which you prefer to my gloomy conversation. I would not want you to find anything in my manner to complain of.

Sincerely,
Lynde

----------

Thomas Crowder to Lynde Falconer

My dear Lynde,

If I didn’t know you so well I would almost believe that you were jealous of my relations with your cousin Minnie. I can only assure you that the mere supposition would be unworthy of you and an insult to her. She is simply a kind and cordial guest, an amusing friend, and seeks to be a good cousin to you and your father. Her feelings toward you are a great deal warmer than yours towards her, and she asks about you every day. I certainly will not hurt her feelings by telling her anything of this correspondence.

As for my own feelings, you do me a disservice. I assure you, all I see in your cousin Minnie is a kind young person who respects my abilities and accomplishments and can converse intelligently. Moving as you do among the highest in the land, and earning their admiration as you go, this may not seem such a rarity to you, but I am disappointed that you begrudge it to me, as such an uncharitable feeling is not at all a sound foundation for marriage.

It is almost time for supper, so I will close this uncomfortable missive and with it, I hope, the subject. Jealousy soils everything it touches, dear Lynde – let us not speak of it again.

Yours,
Tom